What Do You Normally Do When I'm Gone?

[runes_brand]

Who: Brand & you!
What: Rune goes home. Brand reacts.
Where: Around the Rig
When: After Honeyplank & the Riot
Warnings/Notes: Brand-typical swearing, TBA

Brand is on his way to lunch when the bottom drops out of his world. Between one moment and the next, Rune is gone.

Rune's not dead, he tells himself over the hammering of his heart. He's not dead, he's fine, he's fine, he's back home, he's with Addam and the kids, he's fine--

He's running before he even realizes he's in motion, though he's not sure where. Toward the hole in the center of him, probably.

He's fine, he's fine, he's fine, he's fine...

--

He stuffs Rune's sheets in the vents so that Jorgmund can't take them and toss them in the wash. They're sweaty and gross, Rune runs hot at the best of times, but Brand isn't thinking straight. He's desperate to keep what he's got. How long is he going to be kept here alone? Rune said he'd been here a month before Brand showed up, was he going to be here long enough to even them out? Longer?

Bile rises in his throat, along with the urge to scream. He hates this. He hates being separated from Rune, he's always hated it; everything feels sharp and bruised and wrong when he can't feel Rune's existence on the other end of their Companion bond. He doesn't know how Corinne did it when Kevan died, he doesn't want to know.

He wants Rune. Fuck, he just wants Rune.

He leaves their his their bunk to go find somewhere else to hide. He can't be here right now.

Comments

[walkingballpit]

For something that’s not a physical problem, Brand reads like he’s in physical pain.

But then… “Oh. Shi- sprock. Sorry, I didn’t know.”

When Brand showed up, he went on a rampage demanding to know where Rune was. Robbie has half-surprised he didn’t throw Rune over his shoulder and climb to the top of the Rig.

“I can’t imagine what that must be like.” He’s never been married - never been anywhere near that sort of relationship. Robbie doesn’t have to assume the emotional devastation, not with how Brand is now.

There’s a very, very lukewarm attempt at offering a bright side, but Robbie’s hand rubs the skin of his neck, feeling for the implants. “I hope there is safer than here. At least then I could say that least you know the hubs is safe.”

[runes_brand]

"Didn't expect you to know," Brand says. At least the news will put Robbie off his chirpy small talk attempts.

...Just the chirpy ones, though. Brand huffs.

"Define 'safer'. He's a fucking--"

Hang on. Brand stops mid-complaint and turns to look at Robbie, brow furrowing.

"'The hubs'? Do you think we're married?"

No pun intended

[walkingballpit]

He’s all geared up to state the obvious (“Doesn’t have deadly control devices literally embedded in his body?”), but Brand’s confusion triggers Robbie’s own brand of open, wide-eyed uncertainty.

“You’re… not?” He scrambled to read the situation for a better way to describe the perceived relationship without insulting them. “Uh - life partner? Significant other? Boo?”

[runes_brand]

Brand snorts, and it's almost a laugh.

"The word you're looking for is 'Companion'," he says. The Atlantis Robbie's familiar with must not have them because otherwise it's a pretty easy guess. "Even if we were married, that would fucking come first. His boyfriend understands."

If any time passes at all for Rune back home, at least he'll have Addam watching out for him while he's trying to tear down the walls of reality to get back to Brand.

[walkingballpit]

“Companion, right. Very Victorian, wink wink nudge nudge say no more.”

To be honest, he likes that one a considerable amount more than some of the others he’s offered. It’s less sterile, but not as young as ‘boyfriend’.

Although Brand used boyfriend, so clearly there’s a distinction to be made, Robbie still thinks he may steal that. “Whatever open poly thing you’ve got going, you’re worried about. I get it. There’s never anywhere safe to put the people you care about. I’ve thought about adamantium bell jars, but there’s the whole oxygen thing.”

[runes_brand]

Brand reconsiders his stance on tossing Robbie over the edge of the platform.

"It's not a romantic relationship," he growls. "Rune and I aren't in a fucking romantic relationship. I'm his Companion, it's what I am, not how we choose to handle it." He swings around to pin Robbie with a glare. "We've been inside each other's heads since before we were capable of conscious fucking thought, and right now he's. Not. There!"

Part of it is about protecting Rune, part of it is always about Brand's ability to protect Rune, but there's a reason that cleaving a Companion from their Atlantean partner is called a living death and it's not just because their magically-delayed aging catches up with them. Brand feels like his insides have been scooped out, leaving him confused and hollow and agonized, like nothing is ever going to be okay again because Rune is gone.

Anger again burns bright and hot and consuming more than he has in him anymore. Brand slumps again, sliding down to sit on the deck, because he doesn't have it in him to continue to stand.