Extreme Makeover: Home Episodes

[Emryc]

He saw it coming.

Didn't even have to know Aver Brand all that well to recognize the body language of someone fixing to kill. Knew it like he knew his own reflection. To his credit, Emryc did not flinch. He barely even blinked. Even waited, hand poised on his fresh beer bottle, for it to happen.

Eyes shut to the fire, brow faintly knit at the ringing in his ear, jaw twitched at the sensation of blood splattering across the side of his face and neck. There came that line of granite again.

"Now, that's much better isn't it?"

He sat there in silence for several long moments, dripping viscera form his face.

"I just ..." the man opened his eyes, staring at the wall directly across from him in irritation, "bought this suit."

 

[Aver Brand]

“And what happened to the last one?”

A rhetorical question delivered on an arched brow. Because honestly there were only two ways for clothes to meet their end here – shot up or drenched in blood. And since the Coathanger was still alive…

“Galen.”

There was a ‘ma’am’ on his lips as the zeltron appeared in the door. It died as quickly as his eyes settled on the gory remains slumped in the chair. “Ah,” was what emerged instead, though he did not look shocked so much as resigned. “I’ll get out the mop, ma’am.”

“Enjoy your dessert, Qosta. It’s on me.” She rose from her seat and strode straight for the exit.

We’re leaving.

 

[Emryc]

Stormy greys followed the movement of the armored woman as she made quicker work of leaving the scene she just created. Lips thinning, teeth silently grinding, Qosta picked up a napkin and slowly wiped his face. And his neck. And-

"Oh ... best leave it. Wiping will only make it harder to clean," Galen offered gently.

Emryc inhaled deeply, slowly, and exhaled his frustration through his nose. He pulled out his comm and punched in the line for Lead Maw, Ryger.

"Ryger."
"Hot Pink ... bring a bag."
"Ten minutes."
"Make it five."

He hung up and leaned to pick a cigar out of the box, grateful that at least it had been closed against the brain matter.

"Shall I get you a fresh beer?"
"I'll take it at the bar."

 

[Quietus]

Thral home destroyed. Built it on a living mountain.

This could literally only happen to you.

The odds were in my favor.

Are you OK? Do you need help?

I'm fine. Had company during the event. Picked up a new ship, looking to visit you, Verie, and Gabriel.

...

We're leaving.

Outside.

Qui had, apparently, beaten Aver to the exit. She was standing just outside the door, a lit sten in one hand and a Comm in the other. The red was gone from her face and so was the lucid glaze to her eyes. Either the air out here was exceptionally refreshing or she'd used the Stim. The new wave of mental clarity had made her painfully aware that she was neglecting to follow up on her new duties as Matriarch. Namely, checking in on Dissero to ensure Ereza had made good on her word and taken care of him in his time of need.

Found a new place on Naboo in the lake country. We just arrived last week. Still unpacking. Plenty of room for you.

I'll head out tomorrow.

Where are you?

The door hissed open, belching out an armored Mercenary covered in blood splatter. Qui looked up from her messages at the smell, brows lifting.

You...

A short glance was given back through the door as it slowly hissed close. She could just make out the silhouette of Emryc as he stepped out of the private room and headed to the bar.

...right. Home then?

She closed her Comm device and placed it back in her bag, remembering suddenly she had a live sten that was slowly burning away good leaf.

 

[Aver Brand]

The comm got half a bemused gaze before Aver’s attention shifted in favor of the smoking blonde.

Home? she parroted, brows up, mouth a flat line. Thral’s a karking mess, and you don’t like staying here.

 

[Quietus]

I meant your home...

Qui narrowed her eyes in thought, cheeks hollowing as she pulled on the sten.

It's not my favorite place to be, no, but I'm sure Thral's not your favorite either.

I don't mind being there unless ... he's there.

He. Aver's other mate. Her main mate, so far as Qui knew, and that was fine. She didn't care about that, she just didn't want to cross two divergent paths that were plenty well off apart. No sense making drama where there need not be any.

 

[Aver Brand]

Warm flesh turned to cold marble in the blink of an eye. Aver’s spine could’ve been carved from stone in that moment, so stiffly she stood before her mate.

He isn’t.

He hadn’t been in well over a year, but that was neither here nor there.

She slipped back into the speeder without another word, forced her fingers to relax from pale fists around the wheel. Instead of her usual blithe disregard for traffic safety, only an irate, bellicose energy roiled off the merc on the drive over.

And once they reached her apartment, it only got worse.

 

[Quietus]

No questions, no words.

It was easy to recognize that hardening of the mind in tandem with the heart when you lived through it numerous times before. She followed the woman in mental and emotional silence, knowing her well enough by now to give her the room she needed. Aver wasn't one of those hard shells you tried to break - she simply had to open up on her own.

Normally Qui would have been content to give her mate all the time she needed, but she didn't have all the time in the world to wait. The Suzerain was expecting her and so was her family.

Shai greeted them as they walked in through the door with a deep rumble. The massive beast was sprawled out across the floor of the den, taking up most of the available walking space. Tail flicking with lazy enthusiasm, she yawned, considered getting up, then decided she was perfectly comfortable where she was. Qui set her bag on one of the kitchen chairs and let her gaze follow Aver as she moved to take off her armor.

He wasn't here.

It smelled as though he hadn't been here for some time. There was hardly a trace of him left aside from what she assumed to be personal belongings he may have left behind. Brow pinched, lips faintly downturned, she left Aver to her disrobing --wasn't much she could do to help, not being able to touch the metal-- and moved to stoop by Shai and pet the beast's scaly head.

I'm sorry.

She stroked fingers along Shai's crown though she was clearly speaking to Aver.

I didn't know.

 

[Aver Brand]

Priceless phrik plates plummeted onto the bed one after the other. Unbuckled, shrugged and kicked off, the armor was soon huddled in an ugly pile at the corner of the untouched sheets. They were even tucked in under the pillowcase at the top, unruffled by a sleeping merc for a good long time.

“Yeah.”

She yanked on the zipper of the undersuit and shoved the whole thing down until it bunched up at her hips.

“Well.”

Aver stopped dead at the foot of the bed, icy eyes fixed on something far beyond the apartment, the district, the comet itself.

“Neither did I.”

A swift, impulsive sweep of the hand was all it took for the armor to clatter to the floor. She didn’t stay to watch the pieces settle, stalking off towards the kitchen for a tall glass of something strong enough to burn any thought clean out of her skull.

 

[Quietus]

This was ... far more complicated that she expected. And uncomfortable.

It wasn't often that Qui felt so unnerved by a situation that she wasn't able to figure a way through or around it. What had happened between Aver and ... him ... it was a realm so foreign and distant to her that she stood on the brink of intrusion without fully realizing how she got there.

Did this to herself, is what. Hadn't recognized the signs earlier, outside of that restaurant, that maybe, just maybe, Aver didn't want to come here. Or at the very least, didn't want to bring her here.

The whole apartment held a sense of cold bitterness the likes of which she thought she'd managed to eradicate from her connection to Aver. Her eyes slowly traveled the abode, noting the way it looked as abandoned as Aver seemed to feel. Was this what she came home to every time she left Thral? Was this why she had been spending more and more time on Thral with her? Quietus had noted that as well but, much as she had promised herself and Aver, she hadn't tried to pry. This wasn't her business ... but somehow it was.

Not even the vong armor had come out from hiding to greet her here, which seemed unusual. The only being on the premise that didn't appear effected by it was the one beneath her fingers. Shai didn't give a shit so long as she had her pack and, Qui had discovered with some small amusement many years ago, Shai did not like Aver's other mate. So this was all very conveniently pleasing for her, no doubt.

She left the beast to her napping and quietly moved back into the kitchen where she took a seat at the table with a sigh. The thought of leaving didn't so much cross her mind as a viable option, but the atmosphere here felt unwelcoming. Aver had closed herself off. It was clear she was unhappy, upset, and hurting even if she'd never admit to any of those things. Not to anyone and not to herself. There was no easy way to work through this, but in the end Qui decided if Aver didn't want her here ... she wouldn't have brought her here.

The last thing Aver needed was to be abandoned by her, too.

Green eyes slowly swept along the silhouette of her mate standing at the counter, back to her. Watching the way the muscles lining her shoulders shifted, how her ribs moved as she breathed, how her spine seemed like a frozen rod of phrik - the strongest part of her armor she just couldn't remove. It was one of the woman's many attributes that she found attractive, but not her favorite one.

So instead of attempting to crack the frozen shell, Quietus instead opened herself inwardly, offering Ygdris a place to go that didn't feel so cold and empty. It wasn't meant as an escape or an alternative to dealing with her current troubles, simply an option to deal with them ... in the company of another. A way of saying I'm here, Ygdris without really saying it.

 

[Aver Brand]

In that moment, the windswept wastes of Hoth were more welcoming than the mind of Aver Brand.

Where her fingers met the tumbler, thin cracks spidered outwards. The silver expanse of her back was drawn into a taut knot of angry scar tissue, her breath swift and shallow.

She’d seen it a thousand times before, watching life leak crimson from every kind of man under the suns. That’s what she was – bleeding like a stuck pig.

Who wouldn’t, having lost half of their soul?

Aver downed the liquid fire and chucked the glass into the sink. She braced against the counter for a beat, then turned to face her mate with a long, grounding sigh. Instead of meeting those piercing green eyes, the merc fixed her gaze on her crossed arms instead. While the spider had long fallen still, this was the first time that the wolves weren’t writhing against the yoke of alchemical ink on skin.

“Guess I’m the karking fool in the end,” finally tumbled out between sharp teeth. “Thinkin’ I could build anything that wouldna karking collapse.”

 

[Quietus]

If Quietus had known the man that shared his soul with the woman standing before her, she might've thought there were lessons to be learned here. That the foundations of something lasting weren't built upon something that was so incredibly unstable. That building something that could withstand the tests of time and every challenge it faced needed to be done with more than just one facet of living.

That a relationship built upon the things theirs had been was not destined to survive.

But she didn't know these things and she didn't know that man. She only knew Aver and the few things the woman had shared with her over the years. It wasn't much and she wasn't complaining nor regretful.

Her gaze followed that of blue down to the wolf markings on her arm. Finding that for the first time she could recall noticing, it wasn't moving. Had they really grown that distant?

"You're no fool, Aver Brand," that voice was low and rasp from unuse, but distinct in the way it held a very firm belief of every syllable.

Whatever fault was there with what she and he had built together, it was not her burden to take on by herself, though it may have felt that way.

 

[Aver Brand]

Aver’s head jerked up at the sound of her voice. Her eyes were wide, her gaze wild – a feral beast cornered into a trap of its own making.

“My world,” she began, slow and steady lest her voice shake, “is built on this.”

On the timelessness of violence; on the age-honored practice of conquering, robbing, and killing fellow men; on the fact that her hands would stay mired in red until she was dead.

“I don’t know—” she gestured to Nadir around them, then grit her teeth and tipped her head back with a long inhale.

For all the times she’d seen the writing on the wall and adapted herself for the coming storm, this was the first when her whole being rejected the idea. This was a life she’d chosen, a path she willingly set upon despite the enemies lurking around every corner.

“I don’t want to change.”

And that was the rub – she knew she’d have to.

 

[Quietus]

This was a conversation that was difficult to respond to without sounding as though she were coming from anything but a motherly perspective. Speaking to Aver in that way was not conducive to ... much of anything. It placed her on a pedestal above the woman despite them both willingly accepting one another as equals.

So how do you speak on centuries of wisdom without breaking that understanding?

She was nearing 700 years of living, breathing, evolving, changing. Her world had crumbled around her more times than she cared to count. Friends and family come and gone. Lovers and mates lived and outlived. 100 years spent upon a ship trekking across the stars because it had been too dangerous to live upon lands that had been ravaged by the Gulag Plague. Aver could have easily picked up on these thoughts given the open mind Quietus had offered only minutes earlier.

Her gaze left the wolves on Aver's arm for the beast that lay sprawled across the den, gently snoring. Even Shai had changed and adapted her life to the necessity of her world shifting, burning, and crumbling around her.

No one ever really wants to change, and that was the truth. Neither Des, nor Shai, nor countless others she could recall wanted to change. Even now, in her own world, she needed to change. She could not longer remain the recluse she'd desperately wanted to be - felt she deserved to be. This necessity wasn't one of her own life and death, but of the livelihood of her family. Quietus may not ever openly share it with others, but she had come to care about her family. It only took a few hundred years to do it.

The woman took a deep breath and returned her gaze to Aver, concern etched faintly into her brow.

You just have to weigh what it is you want against what you need.

 

[Aver Brand]

“What’s the karking difference?” She laughed, and it was a bitter sound.

Her mouth was a thin red gash drawn across a jaw of stone when she finally met Qui’s eyes. The calm, rational understanding ebbing from her mate broke in futile waves against the indomitable cliff of her mind. There was no room for logic left where rage simmered just below the boiling point. No room for listening either, nor for giving change any thought.

Aver wanted to grind her indecision into stardust; she wanted to tear out the longing out of her chest and watch it wither in the grasp of her hand; she wanted to hunt him down and punish in blood what he’d made her pay in heartache.

“I need what I want. I want what I need.”

Even burning hatred would be better than the resounding echo of the void she heard every time she called out to the other half of her soul.

 

[Quietus]

And this ... Qui felt the distant sting of jealousy bite her spine ... this was why she didn't share. This was why she kept these lives separate. They always somehow manage to cross. Twenty years of care and hundreds of years of experience couldn't keep it from happening. It was a bitter eventuality and not one she'd had to deal with in a long time.

She subdued the sensation and these thoughts. This wasn't about her, it was about Aver.

A moment to look away, to slough off that regrettable pang of anger that may or may not have been fed to her through Aver, she looked back, resolved not to let her own tether to the woman fray.

What can I do to help you?

 

[Aver Brand]

Viewed through the tether of their minds, jealousy literally was a green thing. It lanced through their connection, swift, but no less painful for it.

Aver ignored it.

“Nothing.” Her voice was rough as she spat out the word. “You told me once. How it feels to have a hole left behind. Well.”

She gestured with a rigid hand to the empty apartment.

“You also told me you wanted no part of… this.” And to think she’d cracked a joke about sharing mere hours ago. Every semblance of humor and joy were gone from her expression now. “So you don’t. You won’t.”

Aver exhaled and tipped her head back.

“My mate, my mess.”

 

[Quietus]

Yes, she remembered that night very well. How could she forget?

~~~

Another long pause of silence between them, further consideration, expression unchanging.

Your other mates ... you have a strong bond with them.

Green eyes broke from blues but not out of any shame, jealousy, or reproach. Merely out of thought.

I don't pry into your mind, Ygdris, but I sense things within you every now and then. Sometimes I see things in your thoughts, flashes of memories you share with me without really meaning to. I don't ever comment because it's not my business and ... I don't want to know, really. But I understand that you have long, historied experiences with these other people.

You've been through a great deal together. Life changing events.

You probably know their minds as intimately as you know their bodies.

What you have with them is unique, forged in a way that cannot be replicated with others.

Your connections to each other run deep.

Turbulent jungles met frosted skies, devoid of expectation.

...am I correct in these things?

“Yes.”

Imagine then that you lose them and everything they represented in your life.

To no end that you have any control over.

Gone from you, and yet you live on.

How difficult it is to replace what they were. Impossible, even.

And you keep living on trying to fill the hole left behind.

Maybe one day you find someone new that strikes the same chord and you form a new bond. It's different from before but somehow the same, so you let it take root. Years go by and you create that same intimate familiarity and you have some relief for yourself that you're not alone anymore.

And then it happens.

They're gone.

Quietus' brow furrowed deeper.

And still you live on.

But this time there's two holes instead of one.

And it keeps cycling over and over and over until there's nothing left of you but living and you give up trying to find pieces of yourself in others...

~~~

No, it wasn't her business. Yes, she'd made it clear she wanted to keep it separate. She wanted to have no part in tangling a web with her other mates. It was 100% Aver's battle to fight and in the end Quietus would never wish the life of feeling empty upon another. Aver wouldn't live as long as she had, a blessing and a curse all at once. She was reminded of this regularly, but coming to accept it was something else entirely.

One day she would have to say goodbye to Ygdris... Des was just hoping to postpone that day as long as she could.

Standing from the chair she gave a nod in affirmative, That's true. I did say those things and I appreciate that you've respected that. Leather-soled boots slowly shifted, closing the distance between them one quiet step at a time.

Her body came to stand in front of her mate, close enough to feel the heat radiating off of her but not touching. Green connected with blue, unwavering as she stared upwards.

But you are also my mate. My family. I need you to know that you can come to me for help, even for this. If it is within my power to do so, I will do it for the asking, like you did for me with Arathul.

Do you understand?

 

[Aver Brand]

Aver stared hard at her mate every step of the way. It took exactly five paces and a half for the blonde to cross over from the table to the kitchen. It took another half a pace to meet her toe-to-toe, even if they weren’t actually touching.

Qui was a beast-tamer. She knew not to agitate a feral creature.

Yes.

But. There was always a but.

There’s nothing you can do.

They’d always had a third partner in their relationship, one way or another. Once she’d walked incarnate between them, a sight increasingly mangled by a existence not fit for the confines of human flesh. Then he’d replaced one addiction with another; found a different soulless god to pay worship to.

It’s how this ends.

Death never liked to share either.

 

[Quietus]

She still did not look away, but she understood as well.

Okay.

The desire to reach out and touch her was a strong one that she willfully had to deny. The air had not cleared, the bitterness remained as strong as ever. There was no competing with the raw nature of abandonment. Not here. Not in a place that she held no power over. Wasn't often Quietus felt weak in all facets of her life - it was a humbling experience to be certain.

What would you like me to do?

Tell me what to do Ygdris, I am lost here - a thought she did not transmit but a thought Aver might pick up all the same.

Do you want me to leave?