[PRP] Brother my Brother (Deimos + Cerpin)

[Yamashii]

"Ah, my bad" Cerpin responded dumbly, noticing the bags under Deimos's eyes and finally making the connection. Whoops. Well whatever, he continued climbing the stairs anyways. The guy had an observatory, huh? Cute, it was probably glow in the dark stars painted on the ceiling.

He had not been expecting an actual telescope set up with star maps. Maps that he knew very well after living with Tevini and working with Polair. Stars seemed to turn up in the most unexpected places. He'd thought maybe the papers downstairs were a coincidence but the tealblood might actually know a lot about astronomy after all.

"s**t, you any good at this stuff?" Cerpin's tone was notably impressed and warmer. He leafed through some of the papers, tapping a couple of the maps as if to indicate interest in them. Taking a seat on one of the many pillows (why were there so freaking many? Gog), he thumbed through the hand drawn maps, ignoring the official ones. He'd seen those a million times during his team meetings with Tevini.

"Why didn't she mention this to me? Geez- Perore." Cerpin grumbled, barely managing to catch himself from using the wrong name for her.

"You said you didn't want to go through the military space program?" It was a more serious, less messing around purpleblood in the room at the moment. He glanced at Deimos with a tiny, just a small bit, of respect.

nepsah

 

[nepsah]

Dei practically bounced in place in anxiety as Cerpin went through the room. If he so much as bumped the telescope, he'd be off on his maps. He'd have to start all over again! He was still learning, after all. "Maybe. I think so. I'm learnin' still." He huffed again, wanting to snatch the papers right out of Cerpin's hands. He actually reached out to do it, but thought better of it at the last second and instead began to wring his hands together and shift his weight side to side while he watched. Closely.

"I don' talk to Perore 'bout it mostly, that's why. Or maybe you ain't good friends an' yer just annoyin'." He narrowed his eyes, purposely mimicking pieces of Perore's speech pattern. This would definitely prove that he was a Good Friend and that Cerpin was not. Clearly. "'Sides she teaches me to fight not to map stars, I got someone else for that." He rolled his eyes.

"I said prolly not, I haven't decided. I wanna do what I wanna do so..." He shrugged, trailing off. Why exactly was he telling him anyway? Maybe it was the look in his eyes that did it. "So prolly not, 'less I get to choose what I do an' when I do it."

Yamashii

 

[Yamashii]

"That so? I bet I know a better teacher. I'll have to see if Pol's busy." Cerpin hummed in thought, wondering if Polair could teach a troll how to draw star maps now that she was freaking blind. He and Tevini really needed to figure out what to do about that. It wasn't a problem for the seadweller to be blind but it was something to plan around.

"And you're the annoying one. She tells me stuff cause we're close. You're not close to her if she doesn't tell you this kind of s**t." Cerpin huffed, obviously sore on the topic of his relationship with Perore. Deimos was definitely striking an exposed nerve which put the purpleblood on the defensive in an aggressive manner.

"Don't join the military. There's other options out there. Not many but," Cocking his head towards the boy, Cerpin shared a secretive smirk with him. "I could get you to the stars if you wanted." He said casually as if private space programs were widespread and totally normal.

"Butttt, you'd have to do something for me. Interested?" Cerpin supposed he ought to feel bad making deals with a sleep deprived kid suffering from exhaustion but well, Deimos was a little s**t.

nepsah

 

[nepsah]

Pol... Deimos ceased his hand wringing for a moment to rub at his eyes. "I dunno, my teacher is really smart." He yawned, not even bothering to cover his mouth. His hive. He'd be as rude as he wanted. Pol... The nickname was really.. similar to his teacher... No. This insufferable douchebag couldn't know both of his mentors, could he? "Who is "Pol" anyway?" He had to ask, the odds were ridiculous but he had to know. "And maybe I don't ask on purpose 'cause it ain't my business." He retorted. Since Cerpin wasn't going to move anytime soon, he opted to flop down onto another plush pillow. It felt so nice, if he could just.. lay still...

Cerpin was talking again. He sighed, casting a thousand yard stare at the purpleblood. "What do you know about gettin' up there?" Deimos raised a hand to point lazily at the sky overhead. "And why would I wanna do anything for you? You're awful." He rolled his eyes, letting his arm drop back onto the pillow... The curiosity was eating at him though... Asking what it was wouldn't hurt, would it...? "......What sort of somethin'?" God. He really needed to work on not getting into things just because he wanted to know what would happen.

Yamashii

 

[Yamashii]

Setting the papers back down on the desk, Cerpin leaned over the tealblood sprawled out across a bunch of the pillows.

"You have to promise- not- to- tell- anyone- about it!" Cerpin tapped Deimos's nose in timing with his words to annoy the boy. "You also have to treat my engineer with respect. We don't pull blood rank on Team Space." This was usually the part where people got weird. It was hard for Cerpin to feel out which trolls were sympathetic to the rebel cause and which were strict hemospectrum abiding dickholes. He was sort of getting the feeling Deimos was still a dickhole even if he wasn't a Royalist. Sort of a lose-lose situation.

"Polair's a navigator. Tevini's the engineer and pilot. We're still looking for other experts to bring along. I've been looking for anyone interested in terraforming stuff since we'll need that in case we land on a crappy planet. Some muscley types and a cook too." Cerpin counted the positions on his fingers out loud, loudly and getting louder whenever he saw Deimos's eyelids droop.

"Has anyone ever told you your eyes are like really ******** up? Have you seen a doctor about those bags?" Cerpin's voice didn't sound concerned, more like curious. "Is it that you can't get to sleep or you can't stay asleep?"

nepsah

 

[nepsah]

If he weren't so tired, he was sure he would've bitten Cerpin's stupid finger. Instead he just scrunched his face up with each tap until he couldn't scrunch it any further, and then lazily batted his hand away from his face. "Stop tapping me like that, it's distractin'." Not that he hadn't heard what Cerpin was saying. Why keep it a secret? Since he was going out of his way to bring up blood rank, he assumed this 'engineer' was on the lower end of the spectrum. That wasn't really an issue with him, but honestly he wasn't entirely aware of when he was being a casteist little s**t as it was. "Wait." He sat up, looking a little more awake at the mention of Polair's name.

How!! How!!!!! Did this guy know them both!! "Polair is the navi-person???" He rubbed at his eyes again, tone actually sounding defeated. "This is dumb, I'm not lucid right now. That's obviously the only answer." He tapped at his head with both fists closed, not hard enough to really do any damage but firm enough to try and shake himself into a wakeful state.

"Uuuuuugh I know!! I know they look bad!!" The lack of sleep combined with the impossible odds of Cerpin being attached to two people he looked up to were wearing on his already thin patience. "I can't sleep! I can't stay asleep! Its both! I don't get it- how come you gotta know both Perore and Polair this is dumb. SO dumb. You're dumb. Are you really building a ship??" Curiosity still outweighed his frustration, though.

Yamashii

 

[Yamashii]

As Deimos began a meltdown over Cerpin's connections, the purpleblood couldn't help but grin at the irritation in the tealblood's voice and face. He loved poking at people for reactions like these. Looked like Forera had found an excellent new toy for him. He appreciated that, even if he was a little mad at her at the moment for how this whole Deimos thing had played out.

"Of course I know Polair, I'm building a spaceship, dumbass. My engineer's been working on it for sweeps while I do the recruiting." Cerpin flicked the tealblood's forehead. "We met in the woods under a meteor shower. It was pretty cool." It had been an enchanting moment, one that Cerpin would remember for the rest of his life. He'd be out there with those stars and streaks of light someday.

"And your hive is too quiet. That's why you can't sleep. It's like a ******** tomb around here." Chittentown was much livelier and bustling with noise, especially noise from the nightclub Cerpin ran inside his hive. It felt wrong to sleep without some kind of white noise or music in the background.

"Hold on." The purpleblood dropped a blanket over Deimos's face and his footsteps retreated downstairs. After few seconds he returned, leaning against the door frame and strumming quietly.

"Keep your eyes closed. Just breathe." Cerpin hummed along to the melody, curious if this would have any effect on the other boy. He couldn't discuss much more of the space mission without checking in with Rera about this odd military agent plot she was cooking. He had to make sure Deimos was not being confused into following his idol onto the wrong team. After this, he'd drop by home first and make the trek to visit her in the swamp...

nepsah

 

[nepsah]

"There's lots of people interested in stars dillweed, it coulda not been Polair." He grumbled, rolling his eyes in response. The flick earned a half-hearted swat in response, as if it would really do anything to discourage Cerpin from tapping at him. Ugh, he'd even met Polair the same way Deimos had met Polair. It was irrational, but something about that just seemed rude.

"My hive isn't that quiet. It's just quiet right now." Or so he said- it was quiet most of the time, rendering Cerpin's statement mostly true. He was about to protest, but the older troll plopped a blanket on his face and then disappeared downstairs again. Grumbling to himself about how ridiculous the entire situation was, he pulled the blanket down so that he could see what was going on.

The sight of the guitar almost had him up on his feet- but thankfully it seemed that Cerpin wasn't going to be singing anymore annoying songs. "Why?" Even as he asked, he did as he was told. His eyes burned, it felt nice to close them... and the pillows were so soft... he really shouldn't try to sleep outside of his recouperacoon but at the same time, he didn't feel like getting up.

Yamashii

 

[Yamashii]

"Your eyelids are so heavy, they're drooping, doofus. Just relax. You'll sleep tonight." Cerpin rolled his eyes again at the tealblood's tense irritation. Honestly, even when he tried to do something nice for the boy, Deimos was a little s**t. Sure, he had broken into the guy's hive, argued with him and kept him up past his bedtime and even tackled him into a wall but- ugh, fine, maybe he could kinda see why Deimos wouldn't trust him.

"It's a lullaby. My lusus used to sing em for me when I had trouble sleeping. You'll just get guitar though." Normal trolls probably could fall asleep to Cerpin's singing but an insomniac with obvious trouble both getting to and staying asleep would probably start focusing on the lyrics and end up staying up instead of napping because of it. Better to keep it instrumental.

He hoped Rera was happy. He was honestly trying to do one good thing for this kid.

'When he's not being a ******** pain, he's pretty cute. If only he'd keep that annoying mouth shut more often.' Cerpin thought to himself. He continued playing, listening for any changes in Deimos's breathing. He honestly sort of doubted his music would work but it had been worth a shot.

nepsah

Cerp continues playing for like twenty more minutes before leaving so Dei can either sleep if the music worked or try and get to sleep if it didn't! Wrapping up the thread on my end, will contact you about the next one over the weekend! : D

 

[nepsah]

He wanted to object, it wasn't going to be that simple... It never was. But he remained quiet, focusing on the sound instead of how annoying Cerpin was. He could focus on that later. And also tell Perore that her friends were weird. That would be a fun conversation. Eventually he started to feel sleep at the edges of his consciousness- perhaps Cerpin had been right and the music helped. Around the time he stopped playing, Deimos had drifted into a semi-asleep state and didn't particularly notice the silence creeping back in.

Quote:

final wrap up post, aw yisss