thecapitol | The Binding of Isaac

He was already a preacher, a real one. He shouldn't technically need on no reassurance as to be keeping head about himself as his calling to do. And yet, hearing it feels almost as nice as the preach on for itself.

He doesn't say his thanks aloud. Rather, it's written all over him from the swell of pride in his chest, the lift of his shoulder, to the expression on his face.

It's really a damn shame he couldn't just stay here and preach forever. "ME?" He says like he ain't know. Just playing on his fluctuations, really. He smiles fond on Sam and shakes his head.

Quiet as he can manage, he says, "I'm fucking terrified, of course. I DON'T LIE. Not like that."

And shit, he can't help but grin a little, soft and affectionate, at the way Kurloz reacts to the compliment. Goddamn but there are some moments where the only way Sam can think to describe him is 'cute.'

But Sam leans in close when Kurloz's voice goes quiet, all but pressing their foreheads together so he can talk as low as he needs. And maybe a little bit for the comfort of it.

"Good. If you weren't, I'd have to move from 'damn this is some scary shit' to 'piss my pants terrified,' and Porrim did such a great job on this disguise."

He's teasing, playing it lighter than usual on purpose - both because this is what he does, on missions, and because he's gearing up to try to figure out how to tell Kurloz what he really needs to.

"...I got some news from 13. From Albert."

He takes to that comfort like a moth to light-- maybe not so fitting a description as he is an insect and much prefers dark, but nevertheless. Sam is warmth and comfort and kindness. He wants to soak it up in all every single way he can.

He laughs at Sam's words. "ADMITTING OF FEAR MAKES ALL FOR TAKING OFF YOUR TERRORS? Fuck, if I'd known that's how it got to working maybe I'd have done better by it," He teases back. And yeah, he thinks with a nod, Porrim did great. Porrim, not Dolorosa, that always fucks with his mind.

Not so much as that does though. His eyes go wide.

"WHAT?" He blurts, sudden. His fluctuations make that word spike high, but he thinks even if he could speak normal, it would have gone all as so anyway. "Albert--" He's alive. He's alive? And in thirteen...

Sam grins, briefly bumping his forehead against Kurloz's. "Hell yeah, that's how it works. If I'm gonna be following someone into something like this, I better know they've at least got the sense to be scared."

He shifts his head back a little when he gets into the serious stuff, though, because that's about the reaction he was expecting.

"Yeah. I know, it's a lot to take, but Albert's alive, he's in District 13."

His eyes had closed and he had bumped back instinctive of his being goat. He'd allowed himself just one brief bit of nuzzling as he heard unto that and gone about to chuckling up over it. It was good thing then, because he was scared all the fucking time constant, if more so for this.

But his mind is full on what Sam's saying now. He finds he's still afraid. What if it's a false hope? What if it ain't and they fuck up this mission? Why couldn't his Mituna and Disciple and Gamzee and his other self and his goddamn Da have been saved? But Albert was Alive. He was alive, he was alive, his brother...

He runs a hand through his hair, pushing the long bang he still ain't cut yet back up against his horns. His eyes stare through the ground like he can sift through the words there somehow. It catches him sudden all off guard. He doesn't cry. He's done enough of that already. But fuck if his breath don't catch, if his eyes don't squeeze shut a moment and his teeth don't drag on his black bottom lip.

And then he laughs, small and soft. He shakes his head and drops his hand, blinking fast. It's not quite a smile on him now but it's something close. "THEN I," He starts, falters, then picks. "I guess as we got something more to fight for than just motherfucking conceptual. YEAH?" He shakes his head again. "Shit, man, how'd you get finding this on out?"

Sam's quiet after delivering that news, giving Kurloz time to process it - though he keeps close, shoulder pressed against his.

"Shit yeah we do. We got some good people over there counting on us." But then, that'd been true for Sam before this. Maybe he and Barnes aren't friends, but Sam still likes him, and it's still a hell of a motivator to see this mission successful.

Albert being over there just increases it. Sam'd lost him once, if this is for real - and he has to believe it is - he can't lose him again.

"Radio frequency. Him and Barnes and Cecil managed to send a message through and it got to me, but I got the impression it was a one way kind of deal."

He nods. One way. That made sense. Would not only explain a lack of any earlier means of contacting, but also his informant's mess--

"CECIL!?" The name catches up to him. He's back to staring at Sam, boggled. "Holy shit!" And then he's bringing hand up to push back his bangs again, laughing a second time. "FUCK." Messiahs motherfucking blessing him belated.

"Motherfucking miracles, My brother. HIM TOO? For truth?" Goddamn he'd long thought that motherfucker dead. "DID YOU CATCH HOW AT HE WAS DOING?" While he figured Albert would be missing Jet like something unholy, of course it was important to learn what became of his other old friend, his fellow Avox. (And also maybe his ashen crush, brother was just so damn good up at it, but that was an aside.)

There was importance to in the other bits. In how a tongue-taken motherfucker got on to adjusting.

His eyebrows raise a little at Kurloz's response to that. "Guessing he's a friend of yours?"

Sam'd never met him. But if he's a friend of Albert's and now Kurloz's, not to mention the fact that he helped Albert and Barnes send out the message, he must be a pretty good guy.

"It was a quick message, they weren't able to give specifics. But good enough to help out with getting out a message."

"Fuck yeah, he is!" He says it without doubt. What a strange place he's come to to be able to do so. Even when it has been this long. He is so damn relieved. And scared to hope what others may be there. He tries to focuses on the questions what get of now, the names he knows.

"HE GOT AVOXED HE UP AND DID. Capitol had just gotten on wiping District three right out. CECIL WAS A CAPITOLITE, DID AT THEIR TALK SHOWS AND SHIT, BUT I GUESS AS HE HAD PENCHANT FOR TRUTHFULNESS UNDENIABLE. He took last words up on air to tell us and all and every what things got done by the Capitol to them. NOTHING WHAT AIN'T WOULDN'T BE EXPECTED. But nothing Capitol did get at to like." He's sure Sam can imagine where that went, even without his having said it up already. He moves past the heroics and on to the part where all he recalls a friend.

"I'D NOT BEEN AVOXED, BUT I KNEW OF MY OTHER BY THEN, HOW HE WAS A MUTE. I went on trying to... help I guess. DIDN'T KNOW SHIT. Probably freaked the motherfucker right up and out as in retrospectives. BUT HE TAUGHT ME THINGS AND I THINK WE GOT ON SOMETHING GOOD. They put him up in the arenas like that. TRIED SAVING HIS ASS AND FAILED. He bled out when I tried on pulling him free and my ass got dr--" He shakes his head, faltering. The one thing he really feared what wasn't a base thing. "...DROWNED. But he didn't forget none. WHEN MY TONGUELESS TIME WENT AND CAME, HE WAS THERE WITH ME. He and me and two other Avoxes up in the arena. IT'S EASIER BEING AMONG THEM WHAT IS LIKE YOU. Not so much pressure." He waves a hand. "ANYFUCKINWAY. Mirth, it's good to hear he's doing on good. SENDING MESSAGE." He smiles fondly. Still a fan of the radio he was then. Probably just as goddamn weird. He liked weird. He understood weird.

Sam listens as Kurloz talks about his friend, his own opinion shifting from a vague sense of trust for a guy who seems to be a good friend of the people Sam considers family, to respect for a man who risked his own life to try to do right by the districts so few Capitolites even thought of, and a number of people who weren’t even from his world.

Kurloz is right, Sam could’ve imagined what happened to the guy after that.

When Kurloz falters, Sam doesn’t say anything, but he does curl his hand a little tighter around his friend’s shoulder, giving it a squeeze in understanding.

“Well shit, man, I’m glad I could bring you twice the good news. Looks like we got a couple of pretty damn good allies back in 13.”

His hand rises up, going over top of Sam's and staying there. "Guessing like you got a rightness at to you," He says in answer to that good news.

There's more to fight for. He's never fully been able to get behind the whole of rebellion, the wound is too deep, the salt too familiar, and the enemy too abstract to forgive or trust fully. There's the Bucky what ain't his, but he's only one person. Albert is more, and Cecil too. His family, his friend, people he needed and wanted back. People who were worth risking for beyond the just-as-abstract future of a place what all to escape to.

He can do this for them. And he knows he can do this up in act. He's trained for shit like this, he's sure they can make it. There's only one last thing what grips on his heart, only one bit of fear. But when he thinks of those two, looks at the people all around him, then turns to Sam, he knows it'll be worth the price if the price must indeed be paid.

A thousand times it's been said; if he is a monster, he's invincible, can't be hurt. But if he is not, then he absolutely motherfucking can't lose no one. He followed the Messiahs even knowing there was nothing for him but death, as Mituna had put it once, but he never believed it to be so simple. Even if he had, the Messiahs were his everything. Now was just a few more to the pile.

Words drift through his mind. "You will do great work," So had been said to him. "...It will not go unnoticed."

He breathes deep, and it only sounds unsteady by those listening close. It could mean anything. It could mean nothing at all.

"WE WILL DO WHAT AS WE MUST. There ain't no choice. IF WE MUST MAKE THE NECESSARY SACRIFICES, YOU KNOW WHAT AS I WANT AND WHAT CANNOT BE."

His exhale is perfectly smooth. He's ready. He smiles at Sam and says simply, "THANK YOU."

The Binding of Isaac

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