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[abrightboy]

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Re: The Return to the Barge

[abrightboy]

When Will hugs him, his eyes flutter closed for a second. There's real relief, finally. There's safety. He lifts his head and eases back just enough to see Will's face but not to fully break his grip. He presses a kiss to his mouth and it lingers for a moment because it's also way overdue.

When it breaks, he nods.

"I'm going to make tea," he says. Their tea. In their kitchen. A comforting smell when Will reemerges if nothing else.

He lifts the helmet and carefully places it on Will's head.

Re: The Return to the Barge

[empathicfault]

Will practically falls into that kiss, eyes squeezing tightly closed as he focuses on the warmth and the presence of Malcolm here. They are both rightly in their space.

When they do finally pull away, Will gives Malcolm a nod back. "Okay." And even though Will looks both exhausted and tense, the expression on his face is one of grateful adoration. "Thank you," he says. He shuffles to their couch in the living room, while Malcolm moves to the kitchen.

He doesn't set it for long- only fifteen minutes. The amount of emotional residue he's stuck with, however...he tugs the helmet off after it passes 11 minutes, gasping like he's just run a marathon.

Luckily, it's hardly the first time he's been surprised by his own mind, and he reorients quickly. He's home, Malcolm is safe, the dogs are here. It's okay. If Malcolm isn't readily visible, he'll call out for him.

Re: The Return to the Barge

[abrightboy]

Malcolm's wolf hearing is trained on that living room while he putters around. He's unpacking his bag when Will pulls off the helmet, gasping. He's already had a quick shower while the tea steeped, just to rinse Narrenschiff and infirmary off of him, and he's barefoot and shirtless in fresh sweatpants, his hair damp. He hurries over at the sound. It hasn't been as long as he was expecting so he's visibly concerned.

"Are you okay? Did something happen?"

Re: The Return to the Barge

[empathicfault]

Will's shoulders slump in relief at the sight of Malcolm. He rubs at his face with a light groan. "No, it's just...my mind doing what it does best. Recreating atrocities."

Despite the complaint, Will does seem somehow less stuck in one mode. He's no longer running off of pure survival instinct, and his words are starting to come back to him. "I apparently picked up more of what was going on around us than I realized."

At least coming out of it was far more pleasant than most times. "You smell nice," he notes, with a half-smile.

Re: The Return to the Barge

[abrightboy]

Malcolm is listening raptly to Will’s assessment of his situation and the compliment catches him off guard. A smile starts off shaky but solidifies on his face as the words solidify in his mind.

“I just took a quick one. I thought… maybe I’d join you when you’re up to it. If… you want.” He misses the feeling of intimacy that the beach and Narrenschiff robbed, more than anything else, but he also recognizes that Will might not be decompressed enough to tolerate a lot of… other person energy just yet. Malcolm, fidgeting slightly, decides that Will probably gets it, regardless, and decides to chance saying it. “Is it… is it weird that I feel like… I’ve missed you, even though you were with me all the time?”

Re: The Return to the Barge

[empathicfault]

Will's smile widens at the thought of joining Malcolm for a shower. He sets the helmet aside for now and stands, taking Malcolm's hands in his, letting Malcolm fidget with his fingers if he'd like. "It's not weird. I know I didn't feel like myself. I felt...like time was rewinding, and I was shards of glass again. I'm sure you didn't feel right, either."

He takes a deep breath in and lets it out slowly, leaning down to rest his forehead against Malcolm's. "And now we can relax and retake ourselves again...I hadn't realized how very safe I felt here, until it was gone."

Re: The Return to the Barge

[abrightboy]

He does fidget at Will’s fingers when they’re placed there, absently, like it’s natural. And then Will answers and… there it is and maybe the next breath Malcolm draws - which he feels like it comes with the light that Will gives off - is a little shaky, but something holding tension in the rest of him releases.

“…Like a wet paper bag of broken pieces,” he confirms in a murmur. Before Will started gluing things back together just by treating him like a whole person.

After a moment just lingering there, Will’s forehead against his, his eyes closed, breathing him in, Malcolm lifts his head to look at Will.

“We just… have to get our ship. So we can always get back to that place because worse comes to worse, we bring it with us.” He pauses. “It needs some sort of recall function. So we can do something that calls it to us no matter where or when we are and escape.”

Re: The Return to the Barge

[empathicfault]

Will rumbles with a hum of agreement. "You were thinking that, too. Once we get that, nothing can take it away from us." With the added benefit of nothing taking them away from each other.

Will closes his own eyes and leans in for a kiss. Slow, gentle...grounding. The sort of kiss that could easily last forever. He knows he's not 'better', and that he won't be back to his now-normal state of 'mostly stable' for a while. But he's feeling settled and well, right now.

"Welcome home, Malcolm," he murmurs against Malcolm's lips.

Re: The Return to the Barge

[abrightboy]

He smiles a little. "The safe place is where you are," Malcolm murmurs back, sliding his arms up around Will's neck as he kisses him again. "I love you," he says softly in the wake of that kiss.

Re: The Return to the Barge

[empathicfault]

Every sentence helps him relax a little further. "I love you," Will returns.

They should get back out there, but for once Will's mind completely and utterly rebels at the thought. It's not just that it's a bad idea or that he can't imagine it. His mind won't even bring it up for him, at the moment. Self-preservation actually wins in Will's mind, for once. They're here, the Barge has them, he doesn't care about anything else.

"Do you want your tea, or should we hop back in that shower before you dry off too much?" is the important decision right now.

Re: The Return to the Barge

[abrightboy]

Malcolm wants to feel Will’s skin against his skin more than all the tea in the universe. He smiles and lets his hands slide down Will’s arms to take his hands before he starts walking backwards, tugging Will with him, but also trusting him to steer because Malcolm’s eyes are on Will’s face, like he needs to soak it in after not seeing it for ages.

It had been minutes.