while knox went to texting and comparing him to an image, sam had moved to give captain pets and then returned his hand to hold knox'. it's a soft and subtle touch. warm, inviting.

it makes flashes of the night before surface and he smiles. namely at what knox has told him. that knox was excited to have sex with sam. and then... he says something that sam understands profoundly.

"it does, yeah. that's exactly how i feel. like i didn't know who i was until i met you. it's why i was so terrified when i saw you half dead in mauville."

confessing that he felt as if knox was going to die and it terrified him felt pretty good. he felt relieved.

"it seemed so silly, all those times in books and movies when people say they can't live without somebody. i always took it so literally. but being with you, i realize what they meant. it's not as if i will end up in a grave if you died... but i would feel dead, like i did before. and i didn't even realize i felt that way until you were nearly taken from me last night."

knox prescott

he doesn't really remember moro's house. he doesn't really remember how he ended up there or how the fuck sam got there. which makes him ask - "how did you even find me anyway?" and upon his asking, he jumps, because captain sends a zinger to his ankle. he knocks her with a warning nudge, but she zaps him again right as his phone buzzes again. 

"eden's at her apartment. she'll get here faster if we send your gardevoir." he backs out of his message with her and taps sam's, working on a hunch. 

and then he turns the screen around to show captain. "this is nonsense, cap. you probably scared him half to death." still, she looks pleased. 

he bites his lip and tugs sam closer. "you remember what we talked about that first night we met? you asked me how i enjoy the present and i asked you." he inhales, exhales. "i just - i don't want something to happen and you regret all of it.

"it's easy to start caring about someone. it's fucking impossible to stop." is he trying to give him a way out? it'll break his heart, but he's used to heartbreak. but sam? 

samuel carter

☉

when asked, sam looked at captain, allowing her to tease her trainer, and her trainer teased her back. they had such an odd relationship, but he supposed knox attracted odd. he'd attracted sam, after all, hadn't he?

"she scared me half to death, you scared me fully there." he smirked slowly, a simple thought sent to his gardevoir with the pin that he'd seen in the messages. "i'm a ghost before you."

it's a joke, a tease, poetic words.

"though, that couldn't be further from the truth... i still hold that death is the only sure and final thing in life. it will never lie, it will always claim what it wants. there is no denying it, unless of course, in arrogance."

one cannot be ignorant of death if one is not ignorant of life. with birth, comes death.

"the truth is, i started to care for you a long time ago. i didn't realize it until recently, just how much i cared. it's why i came to that party, it's why i insisted i go. it's why i kept meeting up with you and going on dates...you fascinated me because you made me realize, this whole time, i had been living as if i were already dead. but now? now...

"now i know what it's like to be alive, and to fear death with reverence."

he's not thanking knox for this revelation, but he's not angry for the revelation either. it's just fact, stated plainly, with small kisses to knox' knuckles and hand, before sealing the thought with a gentle kiss to his lips.

and his gardevoir is gone, teleporting to retrieve the woman from the pinned location shared with her through telepathy with her trainer.

knox prescott

i'm a ghost before you. and his words bring about images distorted by dreamscape water, of not-sam with his hands out, murmuring his apologies and telling him it's time to go. he shudders. he knows that sam will get a kick out of it - that at the end of his days, he ended up seeing the man himself as some sort of grim reaper. 

but's he's dumbfounded because sam hits him with a monologue he's in no way, shape, or form prepared for. he shakes as sam kisses his knuckles and his eyes burn when he goes to kiss his lips. 

his nose stuffs up immediately and it feels awful, but he can't stop himself; tears slick down his cheeks, rolling over his puffed skin, turning pink from the dried blood. 

"i'm so stupid," he says. "i want to make you happy. and what happened in my room, i wish i could change it. because it's such a dumb thing. i don't want anyone else. i want you. so if the offer's still on the table to be your boyfriend, your partner, i want to accept, with all my heart."

samuel carter

☉

seeing knox nearly fall apart before him... hurts, but it's sweet. it causes sam to smile softly, eyes following the tears, thumbs very gently brushing them away, mingled with blood or otherwise.

he's patient, he listens. he's beaming by the end of it. because what he knew was true the whole time, knox was finally coming out and saying.

so all he would have to do is be patient and wait for knox to make the first move on all accounts. he could live with that.

"i want you too, knox."

partner... partner in life, life partner. he's testing out labels in his head, seeing which one feels right. but he likes the sound of it. knox is his partner.

"knox my partner; be it in life, or in death."

'till death do they part? no, even death couldn't pull sam's grip away. if knox couldn't push sam away, then death certainly wouldnt' be able to claim him. the parts of knox that were now a part of sam would never leave, and he would be able to sleep at night knowing that.

"whatever parts of you that you'll give me, i'll gladly take. bit by bit, or the whole lump sum. i can be patient. i'd wait a lifetime for you if i had to."

knox prescott

and there goes the happy little fantasy he'd built around himself like a shield. because the moony-eyed boy is still starstruck by the boy beside him, and it's like a slap in the face when the door opens and he sees eden. and he sees her look at sam like she's looked at every other one of his temporaries - dismissive, except without her typical that poor schmuck. 

he squeezes sam's hand, almost defiantly, and he wants to say he's different, i swear he's different than the rest, but he hears those words so clearly in his mind because he's said them to her a hundred and one other different ways. 

and that warmth between the two of them suddenly evaporates as knox starts to question it all over again. 

and you look like shit, too. "yeah, well, asshat put a fuckin' ring on before he knocked me down." he takes his hand from sam's, curls it in their shared blanket instead.

he makes a face. "dunno if it's fractured, but i don't need to tell you it's definitely broken." he side-eyes sam. "got a couple ribs, too." that much he's felt before, the pain of them cracking, hearing them pop in his ears. eden's bandaged that up for him before too.

samuel carter

☉

the feeling of his gardevoir should have given him a heads up about eden being there, but the gardevoir had stayed to herself and teleported, retreated; as if something were going to explode.

it imploded instead. the second eden spoke and knox pulled away, sam wondered... why? why did knox pull away? he wasn't ashamed, he felt knox couldn't possibly be ashamed. eden had always been a subject knox was conflicted about and always ended up changing to a different subject when brought up in conversation.

so sam allows the distance, then looks to eden with a polite and soft gaze. he stands to meet her, holding out his hand to her in greeting. the fact that he's only in his boxers still, having stripped to get body heat for knox so he didn't get hypothermia, didn't bother him. he wasn't a necessarily 'shy' person.

bodies are scientific until thought of otherwise, in his eyes.

"i'm sorry this is the circumstance under which we meet, miss eden. i'm sam carter," he glanced at the makeshift hospital room. "and i'm not a trained professional. i've done what best i can, triple checked everything i could, and the only thing that concerns me is the amount of blood he lost partnered with his broken nose. i'm not sure if internal bleeding has occurred, but i'm also not keen on how to check for it."

he is the first to own that he's not done a perfect job, but he hopes he's done the best that he could have, given their situation.

knox prescott

she hates me and this is a mistake. she's gonna tell sam about every shitty thing you've done because she hates you and you're awful and he's going to leave you too, and then you'll be left alone, really alone, knox, because not even summer will have you anymore. not after what you made your father do to her. 

he exhales, shaking, so very glad that the two of them are exchanging pleasantries. and when he finds it within himself to open his eyes again, he finds that thing in eden's eyes he'd been looking for before. 

pity. 

and maybe she should pity sam. "he's magic, that's how," knox says, saving sam from any further explanation.

he winces when she pokes him, prods him, and in sam's bed, this close to her, he weirdly has the thought of, remember when we tried to kiss? and it brings a smile to his lips, and it makes him hark a laugh, and it makes him so, so sad. 

because she looks so tired and so sad, too, and part of that is his own doing. 

it's going to bleed, she says. he's not sure he has a lot of blood left to give. but he nods and mutters, "kinky," because he can't help himself. he has to do something with the tension. 

and he looks at sam like he wants to say something. his fingers curl because he wants something, someone, him to hold onto, but he can't find the will to say it. softly, he looks back at eden, and says, "try not to enjoy this too much."

samuel carter

☉

the introduction goes well and eden doesn't seem annoyed with him. why he worried about making a good impression was because of how highly knox held her. she was important to knox and, therefore, was important to sam.

he followed her over and stood, but when knox looked at him with pleading eyes and itchy fingers, sam immediately moved to take a seat beside him and to take his hand. he didn't have to ask, sam was just waiting for an opening.

he wants to say that he's right there, that it'll be okay, but he just tries to will the thoughts through the air or through their touch. soft caresses along knox' knuckles as he waits, patiently, and keeps his distance.

"if there's anything i can do to help, let me know."

warm water, set the tampons, open them, whatever. whatever was needed, and if she told him things to do, he'd do them, without hesitation.

for knox, anything.

knox prescott

her eyes betray her. she might be able to hide what's under the surface from sam, from anyone else, probably even her boyfriend, but knox knows. and he's seen that before, not just from her, but every other fucking person that gets this close to him, that comes running when he cries wolf. 

it's disgust and it's frustration and it's a lifetime of hurt, and it's what stays knox's hand when sam puts his near. he thinks, awfully, why won't you take it? why won't you take it when i can't? because where can knox run to now? 

he starts his counting with gritted teeth. it feels worse than it did when it happened and he jerks, bruised ribs aching. his hands raise an inch above and then slap back down onto the bed, curling as every muscle in his body tenses. 

i will kill you, boy. 

he's dizzy by the time eden is poking his face. she knows he wants more, wants something to numb the pain, but she's cruel and she knows what's best for him. maybe sam - but he shoves that train of thought as far away from him as he can. because he won't prove eden right. he won't ruin the boy beside him. 

not like he's done before. 

he lays back again as his face numbs. "nmm, how'doi'look?" he says, with the bloody tampons in his nose and a puffed up, but better looking nose.

samuel carter

☉