revivalproject | I didn't mean for it to happen

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I didn't mean for it to happen

WHO: Billy, Tommy, Bucky/The Soldier, OTA
WHERE: Temba, YA House
WHAT: The aftermath
WHEN: Early June
WARNINGS: TBD

The Return & What Follows (for Tommy)

Billy screamed, and the world dissolved. The Shadow had shielded him from the worst of it, assaulted by those memories in a non stop barrage for however long they were in there, but now he remembered it all. He dimly registered he was back in his calibration room, hoping he'd managed to release the others before he collapsed heavily onto the floor. He shouldn't have been able to perform that level of magic here. And whatever had allowed it abruptly cut it off with his return, utterly drained from the experience.

He was unconscious, in and out of nightmares for days before he finally jolted awake in a cold sweat, practically tumbling from the bed in his race to the bathroom to retch.

What had he done?

Avoidance [OTA]

Even after he awoke, Billy didn't want to leave the house. He was ashamed and scared, and used the excuse of resting for far longer than was true.

A few faces managed to hunt him down there, and it wasn't like Billy could turn them away, eventually relenting and breaking down a few of those barriers.

After that it was a little easier to venture out. It took a few smaller outing before he was able to get as far as the Hospital, but there at least he could focus on work.

(For Bucky/The Soldier)

Billy knew he probably wanted to stay hidden away as much as he did right now, but after what they'd been through together in the other world, he trusted the man to help him with this. Tommy and the others would refuse, but he was confident Bucky would understand. And he needed to apologize.

His magic was still weak, but it led him to the general location where he was meant to be. Billy couldn't quite meet his eye when he found him, swallowing thickly and looking uncomfortable.

"...Hey. Could we talk?"

Apology- Network- Text

I can't begin to make up for what I put you all through this last month. I had no right, and I'm so sorry you all got caught up in this mess.

I know that doesn't begin to make it right.

They did something to me. Like Calibrations...but worse. I don't know how. And I'm not trying to make excuses for what I did but- I'm scared they'll do it again. To any of us. I thought people should know.

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"GAH!" Cayde yelped back, the little jerk in his own surprise enough to make him slip from whatever awkward hold he'd had above. He fell, grabbing at the window sill to keep from further embarrassment, still insistent on playing it cool even as he hauled himself up to hook an elbow over.

"Oh, just hanging around. Thought I saw you come in, figured I'd say hi. -also, trying not to fall out of a window."

Billy cursed and hurried forward to try and help pull him inside. The scare did at least lighten the mood some, Billy almost forgetting the awkwardness until Cayde was back and settled on two feet, and abruptly it struck him, making his features twist uncomfortably with guilt.

"...So. Um...How are you...doing with everything?"

The Exo thanked Billy once he was on the right side of the window, dusting himself off casually like he hadn't nearly taken a clumsy spill.

"Shouldn't I be asking you that?" he replied, question for question, giving a tug of his hood to make sure it was in place before he finally looked back at the teenager. "I'm fine, by the way- just been making rounds." Reconnecting. Reassuring himself. "Totally going to miss having ramen almost every day but I think that's a fair trade-off."

"Everyone's asking me that," he mumbled, clearly not comfortable with it. He'd turned everyone's lives upside down, why were they so concerned about him?

"I uh...I make some for Tommy sometimes. I'm a bit magically drained right now, but I could make you some too," he promised.

People didn't just go creating an entirely different life for people on a whim, that's why! Cayde smiled crookedly, reaching out to ruffle Billy's hair. "Should we not be? You're part of...whatever weird team this is. Team He Row?" He winced at the sound of the name. "Maybe not Team He Row."

The offer wasn't something he'd been expecting, which made him blink before waving a hand. "Wha- oh geez kid, don't worry about me. Offhand comment- ramen's the least of my concerns. I wasn't asking for anything, and I'm definitely not meaning to push you to it after all that."

That hair stayed a ruffled mess, even when Billy tried to push it back into place with flushed cheeks. "I mean...I basically brainwashed and kidnapped you all, I don't think anyone would be wrong to be mad."

"No, I- I know, I just...I don't always think about it. I make stuff for me, or Tommy, but-...I don't always think to offer it to other people, and-...Cayde I'm sorry. For everything-"

"Well...yeah, true," the Exo conceded. There really was no getting around that. "That was a bit extreme, I will admit. Was I mad?" He folded his arms, head tilting as he considered that. "...no. I don't think I was. And I'm still not. I was..."

He shook his head as he thought about it, turning a circle to face the window. "Look, kid. There are a lotta things I don't think about. They just kinda flit past or I miss 'em completely. I mess up. We all mess up."

He closed his eyes for a moment. "I'm not saying this was a mess up. Okay, it was kind of messed up. But you were hurting, and you just wanted things to be good. Happy. And you just pulled everyone in with you."

Billy still couldn't quite believe him when he said he wasn't mad, even hearing it aloud, but he nodded softly.

"...I'm scared they'll try and bring me down there again. Or someone else," he admitted.

"They?" The Exo looked back over at Billy. "Maybe we can...I dunno, blow up the entrance or block it off somehow? Would that work?" He was voicing his thoughts. That tunnel, those rooms, it was all bad news from the start and there seemed no reason at all to have them. Billy's power had just expanded the possibilities to frightening proportions.

"...I was scared because I thought I'd lost everyone, even when they were right in front of me."

It wasn't a light admission in the least. Not mad. Anger didn't cover that scope of loss, that helplessness. Cayde looked out the window again, as though he could see that busy cityscape again, right outside.

"I dunno, whoever...makes us do that stuff? I guess it's not the Agrii, since they tried to pull us out, but..." He nodded anxiously. Billy'd started barricading the door when he sleep for fear of being pulled down there again. If there were more barriers in place he'd feel a whole not safer.

He winced apologetically. He knew how that felt, to have the world falling apart around you and people you cared about literally blind to it. It was a terrifying feeling, and he hated that he'd put so many of them through that.

"I can't imagine how horrible that was for you, Cayde... Really I-... It's almost worse that way, isn't it? Makes you feel crazy..." And alone. God. "...I never got to thank you for trying to wake me up...I'm sorry I couldn't do it in time."

"We'll figure it out. I got some grenades from Coruscant I've been itching to try out."

His shoulders tensed, barely loosening with the laugh he forced. "Crazy... Yeah, that'd sum it up. There were enough times I had to question myself. Helped a lot to find some other people that still held on to what they knew to be real." Blinking, he glanced back at Billy then, his smile crooked.

"Didn't really know just what was going on then, otherwise maybe I would've tried harder. But then again, I'm not sure how well that would've gone." He shook his head. "You still snapped out of it eventually. Someone managed to get through to you, that's what counts. I wasn't much help in the end for that," he admitted, an apology of his own in his tone.

"Yeah, well, that's on me too, isn't it?" Since the Shadow had very much been a part of him.

"...back home...right before I came here, we were being attacked by this...parasite thing. And the adults couldn't see that anything was wrong. My own parents dragged me back to her so she could eat me, and couldn't understand why I was doing this to them when I left. I know a bit about what it feels like when no one can see the truth. I'm so sorry I put you through that..."

Cayde grimaced at that. "Let's just not do that again, yeah?" he suggested, his words tempered with a faint grin that he didn't feel yet stubbornly held on to. At least until Billy started relating about other things.

"They tried to what??" That sounded a special kind of wrong and the Exo wasn't sure Billy would want to elaborate on that story. Given the current mood he decided further details weren't as important.

"Thankfully I'm stubborn," he said, snorting lightly. "We'll be dancing this thing in circles, kid. Apology accepted. I'll just be happy with no repeats."

No. He shook his head with a frown.

"It's a long story," he dismissed. Someday maybe they'd talk about it, but it wasn't important now.

He smiled softly, and nodded, raising his fingers in what he thought might have been some sort of scouts honor. "I'll do my best," he promised. He definitely didn't want any repeats either.

After everything, talking about more troubling and regretful events just felt counterproductive at the moment anyway. Although usually he'd let curiosity get the better of him, Cayde let it go with a nod.

That promise seemed to be enough for Cayde. He grinned again, reaching out to give Billy a pat on the shoulder.

"Now, I figure you'd like your space so I'll get out of your hair if you want."

"Don't go through the window again," he teased lightly, still wondering what the heck Cayde had been doing out there.

He offered a small, grateful smile, and palmed at the back of his neck.

"But Agrii stairs are killer!" Cayde lamented. And telling the Hunter not to go through the window was like telling the cat not to push things off the table.

He brought a hand up tapping a two-finger salute off as he made to go towards the actual doorway- before turning and bounding back for the window with a mischievous grin. It wasn't the window he actually exited through, but the wall beside it as he vanished in a shimmer of light just before it seemed he'd hit it. From outside came his shout.

"Wasn't through the window!"

"Cayde--" Billy swore his heart stopped for a moment, completely unaware the Exo could do that, and he breathed out a sigh of relief at that shout.

"I'm going to banish ramen!" he called after him.

The choked wail that responded was almost comical. "Oh my g- don't make me come back up there!!"

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