thisavrou_log | ( OPEN ) what you don't know won't hurt you

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( OPEN ) what you don't know won't hurt you

Who: Ivan Vorpatril & VARIOUS (including YOU)
When: the month of march (and stuff backdated into feb.)
Where: all around the ship
What: catch all log post and OPEN LOG
Warnings: none!

I. BAR

If his cousin is bartending, and even when he’s not, Ivan can be found at the bar most evenings. Some days just for a quick drink in passing, other nights he’s there until late in various states of inebriation, never crossing the lie into intolerably so. Affable and open, it’s no hardship to start a conversation with him; get near him and he might just start up one himself.

II. ON THE JOB

Ivan’s job is the least demanding on the entire ship, and he likes it like that. There’s days he fills with playing the non-terrifying games on his MID, at least between running around and making sure Navigation and Communications aren’t at odds with each other. Which they don’t ever seem to be, which makes his job that much easier.

Most days he can be found at his desk, slowly working on whatever demands have been made of him to stretch out his workday. The mealtimes that he doesn’t run off to the mess hall for, he takes in Navigation — munching on whatever food they managed to cough up while watching the stars pass them. Either way, it’s quite easy to pull his attention from his job should someone require it.

(( if you want something more specific, please feel free to PM me or PP @

robutts ))

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Miles makes a face and a no details, thanks wave of his hand, but he has to kick extra hard for a few moments just to keep his head above the water and he almost regrets such a small movement. Ivan looking clueless isn't really anything to write home about, but this kind of shock on him is sort of a novelty. A relatively harmless one, he thinks. Or a beneficial one, even. A little infatuation is good for the soul... The corner of Miles's mouth curves up.

"What d'you know," he says between breaths, "you're finally doing right by Lady Donna. Paying it forward, eh?"

"I thought I did right by Lady Donna every time she had an orgasm," Ivan points out with a wry twitch of his lips upwards. "But yeah, that's the idea."

And he wants to, he so desperately wants to. But even cutting through his panic about being infatuated with a woman for the first time in his life -- actually infatuated rather than the general like for all women he relies on to sleep with them. And enjoy their company. "Miles--"

Switching the subject? Absolutely, but even Ivan notices how much effort this is taking for Miles, how tired he looks. "I think I'm done for the evening. Let's head back, eh?"

Miles wants to wave Ivan off just on sheer principle -- pride is such an ugly thing sometimes -- but he feels like he's swaying in the water, and that can't be a good sign.

"Yeah, I think -- I think need to get out of the pool," Miles says breathlessly, suddenly looking a little glazed. But he doesn't move, his burning lungs and limbs failing him. Strange, how just a few feet to the ladder seems like such an unfathomable distance now.

Ivan waits, and then waits, and then decides to hell with Miles' pride -- he kicks over to his cousin, wraps an arm around his torso, and bodily lifts him up onto the edge of the pool. Problem solved, no need to thank him.

"Have you thought about doing this thing called napping, Miles?"

Miles doesn't respond, just sinks into a shaking heap at the side of the pool, great tremors pulling through his whole body. Napping, ha, right -- he'd like to, but only if it comes without the nightmares. He's not even sure he's not asleep right now, because he feels nightmarish enough. Ivan's voice fades in the background, drowned out by the soft splash and lull of the pool, suddenly much, much louder. It sounds hollow and tinny, distant, and far bigger, far more merciless. He didn't need to just get out of the pool. He needs to get out. Miles sucks in a deep breath, a gasping gulp of hair, but it does nothing to stop the shaking. No -- no, he doesn't want to remember this right now.

Alright, well, now he's worried -- Miles starts shaking and Ivan acts on instinct, reaching down to wrap his arm underneath Miles' shoulder. Wrapping one arm around his shoulders, he hunches down to be on Miles' level. He knows his cousin hates being carried about, hates the blow to his dignity, and as he isn't injured, Ivan will give him this.

"Alright, back to the room we go." He helps Miles stand, leading him out and only stopping to scoop up their things.

Miles shakes the whole way there, shivering as though he's cold beyond freezing, clinging heavily to Ivan without really thinking about it. He doesn't remember most of the trip back to their room, just that he's wet and cold and dripping chlorinated water all over their cabin floor. His muscles are still burning even though he's out of the pool, and that almost painful pressure in his chest hasn't eased any now that he's out of the water. It should be. It should've been better. But the water, cold and wet and dark... He doesn't seem to register Ivan until they're back in their cabin and then his face goes white and he stumbles back with a gasp, tripping over his own feet.

"What-- Miles," he says, reaching out for his cousin at the sudden look of shock and fear on his face. This is bad, Ivan knows that, but he doesn't know how to help as much as he wants to. At least Miles didn't get him soaked, as wet as he already is. "You look like you've seen a ghost."

He looks just as terrified, too, bloodshot eyes watering under the hair matted to his forehead. He's aware that he's soaked, that he hasn't dried off at all and he's just dripping water onto the floor, but it's second to the panic. His breath catches in his chest and he jerks back away from Ivan, backing away another few steps until his back hits the wall unexpectedly.

"You can't be here," he breathes, his voice choked. "You can't."

"Of course I can," he counters, confused as hell. This is his room, and sure, he has another one now, but it's the one they've shared ever since they got here. Ivan digs around for a blanket or a towel, and manages to find one of the latter and tosses it at Miles. "I live here. It's not your private room, Miles."

He doesn't like the panic on his cousin's face, or the shock. It's unnerving.

"No, no, no," Miles says breathlessly, like a mantra. His voice creaks into an anguished groan. "No, you're -- you're dead. You died. Why -- "

He catches the towel mostly because it's thrown at him, nearly fumbling it, but he doesn't make to dry himself off. He barely seems to able to identify it. He remembers, all too vividly, the sight of Ivan's body in that chamber at the pumping station, his skin wash too-pale. They'd been too late. Galen had never intended for him to live. Too late...

Miles twists the towel in his hands, unconsciously mirroring the feeling in his gut. Is he being punished, with this hallucination? Murka and Beatrice were bad enough, but Ivan... "Why are you here?" His voice only comes out as a cracked whisper, water standing in his eyes. "What did I do?"

"Swim?" In the answer to his last question. The rest of it, though-- "Miles, what are you on about, I haven't died."

Ivan reaches out for Miles, concern lodged in his throat even as his stomach feels like lead. "I live here, with you and Gregor, Miles, what--" How could he think he have died? Ivan avoids things like that like the plague. Miles knows that, he hasn't even been in any danger on the ship recently.

Ivan's hand closes around Miles' shoulder, and while he doesn't try and shake some sense into him, his grip is strong and solid. "Miles."

Edited 2016-04-13 07:38 (UTC)

"No," breathes Miles, and he looks like he might flinch, might pull away from Ivan, but he doesn't. "No, I found your body. I was too late, I couldn't..."

He needs to get himself under control, he knows that, but his chest is impossibly tight and he can hardly breathe. He feels like he's drowning in it. Drowning. No, no, no...

"Galen never intended to let you live," he says desperately, almost pleadingly. He doesn't want to cry -- he feels sick with shame -- but the tears spill down his cheeks anyway, and he clutches at Ivan's wrist with both hands, tight like he's hanging on for dear life. "I wasn't fast enough. I'm so sorry, Ivan, oh, God..."

Ivan kneels then, dripping water down so he can grab both of Miles' shoulder -- to steady him. "You found me, Miles." Not his body. Not in that-- Ivan shudders, trying to shove away the memory of it. No, no, they're fine. Ivan's fine.

"It's okay, Miles-- I didn't--"

He doesn't know what to do, how to deal with the fact that his cousin thinks he's dead. Not in the slightest.

"No -- no. No, you're dead, you were dead, I'm sorry -- " Miles's voice breaks and he clutches at Ivan's wrist with both hands, looking up at him entreatingly, desperately, trying to impress it on Ivan. He remembers it, he's sure of it. He's dreamed of this before...

"Oh, God, I'm sorry," he chokes out again, shaking his head furiously. His pupils are unusually dilated, the usual gray mostly swallowed up by black. "I'm sorry, Ivan, I tried -- I tried but I was too late and it's my fault -- God dammit!"

He lets go of Ivan's face to claw at his own, nails digging into his scalp as he tries to gulp down short, heavy breaths. He can't breathe in all this devastation, and he just about folds in on himself. "I thought I could save everyone, I thought I could work fast enough and I was wrong. I'm sorry, Ivan, I didn't -- I couldn't -- "

Ivan's frown only increases before it's chased away by worry -- he crouches down in front of Miles to pull his hands away from his head, careful not to use too much force or hurt his smaller cousin. "Hey, hey." He's never seen his cousin as distraught as this, not really. It churns something within him as he struggles for something to say that will let Miles know he didn't let him drown.

Because of course he didn't. Ivan knows that Miles can't save everyone -- no one can -- but he saved him when it mattered. "You did, Miles. I don't think I've ever been more thankful for your insane savior complex, but you did."

"But I saw your body," Miles says desperately, on the verge of hyperventilation. "All pale and -- I remember. Why would I remember?"

His distress shifts from anguish to helpless confusion, and he lets Ivan pull his hands away from his head, shaking. He swallows, looking up at Ivan in some kind of terror. His voice is a cracked whisper. "Are you really here?"

He can't tell anymore, not with how many ghosts he's been seeing lately.

"I don't know," Ivan says, swallowing the panic he feels not completely. But if he freaks out, he knows Miles will too -- at least like this. Damn the man for constantly being the one not panicking while Ivan does it for him. Lowkey like. "Maybe you're just-- had a nightmare, or something, and you think that you saw it but really didn't."

But he keeps his face straight, eyes worried even as he searches from some clue for how this happened. "Yeah. Unless I've been missing something really important."

That's a straight shot, and Ivan expects Miles to latch onto it.

Miles looks up at Ivan's face, frantically searching, and for a moment he still looks mired in doubt -- not of Ivan, but of himself, of whether or not he's realy having this conversation. But he's tired, dammit, and Ivan seems so whole and real and alive. Miles, trembling, lets out a heavy breath and falls against Ivan, squeezing his eyes shut.

"Good," he says, sounding painfully breathless. His voice is choked, though he's cognizant of it now, trying not to let it show. Thank God is the unspoken half of that. It's his mother who's the spiritual one, not him, but it doesn't hurt when it comes to life and death and loved ones. "Alright. Good."

Ivan finds himself wrapping his arms around Miles on reflex back, in an uncharacteristic hug. If anything, he feels like Miles probably needs it. "There's no way," Ivan says with a measured amount of assured conviction, "that I'm going to die before you."

But somehow Miles' relief to find out that he's not dead is -- he's not sure what it is. He never really though it'd mean much to Miles; even though they're cousins. More than the usual amount, that is, but finds himself oddly surprised that maybe he'd been wrong.

Well, Ivan considers, Miles wouldn't find that to be news.

Miles lets Ivan draw him in for a hug, pressing his forehead to Ivan's chest while he tries to regroup, tries to find his breath. He's still shaking, but he lets out a breath that could almost pass for a laugh as he clenches his hands at his sides, just trying to reel himself in. He's dripping a small puddle on the floor, he realizes, and he sucks in a deep breath like a drowning man come for air. He's dizzy and suddenly so, so tired.

"I need to dry off," he manages, half-making for the towel he'd dropped on the floor, but he sways.

Ivan reaches out to steady him and gently steer him towards his bed. "I'll get you something, but get into bed, Miles." If he gets the sheets and the mattresses soaked then that's fine, they'll both live with it.

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( OPEN ) what you don't know won't hurt you

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how dare you

what are u gonna do about it

cries at

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