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Sue graduates from Tactical School a year early, he's barely fifteen. He's toned down the flirting - he treats Aegis completely platonically, in particular - and has cut down on the unhealthy amount of sleeping-with-everything-that-wants. And he's apparently, via his independent study, gotten far enough through the curriculum that they're nudging him along to Command.
They've given Sue a strange old man for a tutor, who appeared in his room and started a physical confrontation, which Sue won; Sue related this story to her with something between amusement and irritation.
And a quicker-than-average flurry of notes has been piling up in the psych data since about that time, according to the timestamps.
Aegis knows before they tell her that they're going to send her to Command early too. She's just barely fifteen herself when she gets another update of the psych files and sees that Sue's had - well, the files aren't terribly clear, some of the communication is happening via in-person conversation and memos that don't get stored in these folders, but Sue's had some kind of breakdown and the only things they can think of to get him out of it, get him back into shape to train and fight, are her friendship and Howlett. They have mixed feelings about both - Howlett's insubordination problem; their bewilderment that Aegis and Sue can be so close when "she's the one person he can't link!" - but they're desperate.
Bird? They don't talk as often over the long distance, just as there was a lull when he went to Tactical ahead of her; their schedules have nothing in common and their contexts less. But he knows her, and he can reach this far if he tries. And she wants to know what's wrong.
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autokinetic
He mumbles something unintelligible into his pillow.
autokinetic
"I was kinda hoping for a warmer welcome than that," says Aegis, closing the door behind her and swaying.
He curls up and starts to cry.
autokinetic
"Oh - oh Sue," she says, and she sits on the bed and leans over him and hugs.
He burrows into her lap as much as he can without uncurling.
autokinetic
"Sue, Sue, my bird, my bird," soothes Aegis, "it's okay, I'm here, they say I can come whenever I want, you don't have to be all cooped up by yourself..."
He wraps his arms around her and cries some more, quietly but steadily.
autokinetic
She holds him and waits. Occasionally she murmurs "my bird" again.
Eventually - and it takes a while - he calms down enough to emit a word.
Tiredly: "Hi."
autokinetic
"Hi," she murmurs. bird bird bird what's wrong? I thought you were holding up okay...
"Bad day," he says wryly, resettling himself to put his head in her lap.
Weird dreams, he adds by link, and sends a confused impression of his cuddlepile with Kas and Petaal and Amariah and Ivy.
Weird dreams, he adds by link, and sends a confused impression of his cuddlepile with Kas and Petaal and Amariah and Ivy.
autokinetic
Aegis pets his hair. ...You dreamed about other mes and yous before, but that one's... huh.
He closes his eyes and relaxes under her hand.
"So where'd you come from, anyway?"
"So where'd you come from, anyway?"
autokinetic
"I graduated Tactical a couple of weeks ago and they haven't let me see you till now, but now they want me to talk you into going back on the simulator. Somehow. For some reason," says Aegis, dutifully playing for the likely hidden cameras and going on petting his hair. "They moved Howlett too, at the same time, he thought it was probably about you to begin with, I don't suppose you've seen him?"
"Take a guess," he snorts.
"Yeah." He sighs, too. "It's been just me and mysteriously appearing meals for like a month or something."
autokinetic
"A month," exclaims Aegis. "What'd you ever do to them? You killed a guy in tactical and they do nothing and now you don't show up to play games and they put you in solitary?"
Not really a month, right, bird?
Not really a month, right, bird?
"Maybe not a month," he admits. "Feels like a month, though. At least a few weeks. And they're completely fucked up, but hey, I knew that already."
autokinetic
"The guy who sent me here said you don't want to play to 'extort information' from the higher-ups," Aegis says, twirling some of his hair around her finger. Giving him the usual haircut would have required more human contact than he's been allowed and he's shaggier than usual.
"They're hiding something," he says. "I don't know what it is, but I'm really fucking tired of it."
autokinetic
"It's apparently really important. I mean, the thing they're hiding isn't necessarily important, they could just be being obnoxious about need-to-know and clearance and stuff, but the getting you on the simulator, if they're pulling illegal not to mention ineffective crap to get you to do it." Pause. "I wonder why. They could just ice you. They iced people in Battle School, in Tactical, I haven't seen it here yet but they must do, they can't just be chasing a sunk cost..."
"I'm some kinda special," Sue agrees. "Pretty sure I'm the only kid in the school with a teacher who wakes him up in the middle of the night to yell at him, too."
autokinetic
"You're good, but there's lots of kids who're good," muses Aegis. "Are they in some kind of hurry...?"
"Maybe the buggers are coming to blast us off the planet," he snorts.