The lights were bright and buzzing, the sounds were loud and blinding. He had drunk some water, so his lips didn't feel chapped. Everybody seemed to be having a good time, which was pleasant; his eyes felt dry and he could not make out shapes, but only because he was not focusing on anything. He breathed in through his nose and exhaled before his lungs were properly full.
He was tired.
He couldn't tell, because being tired had made his mind numb to most sensations. But he was so, so tired. His arms were heavy and his legs seemed rooted in place.
He didn't even know what would happen now. He pressed his thumb against his palm absentmindedly, wondering only barely coherent if he'd stay like this forever. If they'd stay like this forever. Their situation hadn't even been addressed. No solution had been offered. He could try to remember if anybody had mentioned it, but he could not right now. Not right now.
He was tired.
Takanuva was talking. He had been talking for a long time, explaining everything he'd seen and heard, with Kazi sometimes interjecting without interrupting very loudly under him - something something that piraka something something, stupid riddles something something other motive something something, if I see him again I'll something something - only to be forcibly shushed by Dalu smacking him silent, followed by the conjoined effort of several other Matoran to stop her before he ended up concussed. Takanuva went on talking, completely engrossed, making shadow puppets as he had before the Great Beings to help his narration, and Vakama looked at him proudly until one of the other Turaga would elbow him gently without a word, only a sly smile, and he would avert his eyes for only a moment in a bashful manner. Takanuva continued talking, answering Kiina's questions as rapidly as she fired them at him, their velocity unmatched by everybody else - the amount of times Raanu had tried to have something repeated to him was too great to be quantified by now, though he still hadn't given up on it; Gelu looked at him, amused, only sometimes leaning over to Zaria so the quiet Toa could give him a very quick recap of everything that had been said, with Chiara inevitably hissing more details as she evidently found his narration utterly lackluster. Takanuva kept talking, talking, talking, like he could have never gotten tired of it, Kopeke at his side writing everything down so furiously that his hands were barely even visible.
Pohatu was so tired.
A hand grabbed his own and pulled him up.
He followed without thinking as it dragged him away from the noise and light. It was soft: the sensation dispelled some of the fog in his brain - not enough to let him see, but he knew he wasn't going anywhere dangerous. He wouldn't have done that to him.
He began focusing on his sorroundings again only when he was sat down on the bed.
He looked up at Kopaka. His mouth tried to grin at him like usual and thank him for taking pity on him, but his tongue couldn't move yet and he only managed the faintest idea of a smile.
Kopaka himself only stared at him for a little, standing in front of him.
After a little, he was the one to speak first.
"I won't call you brother anymore."
Pohatu felt like bursting into tears right there and then.
Not in earnest pain or sadness, necessarily. Just as a reflex.
But some numbness was still clinging onto him, and so he didn't; he just looked, lips barely parted in a quiet stupor, waiting for some of his faculties to return to him so he could properly process those words and hopefully find a way to reply to them that could have been deemed appropriate.
"Are you that mad at me?" he finally asked, very softly.
The other Toa's right eye (the one the visors of his Akaku tended to hide) twitched as if recoiling from a hit.
He stepped forward - he had sat him down on the bed and then stepped away, weird - and laid a hand on his shoulder: his fingers sank into his skin softly, with a comfortable chill, very gently caressing him with the tiniest of movements, and he hunched his back so that their faces were on roughly the same level.
"I am furious," he said, with an expression and a tone that was very much not furious at all, which made Pohatu straighten his spine in relief, "But this has nothing to do with that."
"So we're still friends," the Toa of Stone smiled.
Another twitch: "For now."
Something about the way the other held himself, limb tense against him, visage almost straining, reminded him of Lesovikk. Of how intense he had looked and sounded when he'd declared he'd be going off to kill Karzhani with his bare hands, unknowingly dooming the two of them to the Red Star's hellish metamorphic nature, leaving them trapped within these organic full body prisons.
He caught the slightest motion on his lower lip. He was probably biting a little bit of it. He seemed nervous.
He tilted his head again in lieu of asking.
A sharp inhale.
"There is," Kopaka spoke again, very quietly, looking directly into his eyes, "A very specific word I want to call you by."
How interesting.
They both waited a moment: silence.
"I just don't know which it is." the Toa of Ice admitted.
Pohatu widened his smile.
"Can't be harder to find than a Kanohi mask," he joked. "And we've got plenty of experience with that already, anyways."
The other cocked an eyebrow: "We?"
He nodded: "I'll help you look for it, of course. I wouldn't want you to get caught in another cave avalanche without me there to shove you to safety. And this time you won't even have to save my life! Since, you know. Our elemental powers haven't been stolen. Yet."
"Don't jinx it."
The Toa of Stone laughed gently at his friend's furrowed expression.
He looked at him - really looked at him.
Past the skin and hair.
Past his lovely face.
Past everything.
"I could call you by it too," Pohatu said. "When we find it."
Kopaka did not respond.
His eyes widened slightly. His hand tightened just a tad around the other's shoulder. The room was fairly dim; his cheeks seemed to grow a little bit darker still.
"If you'd like that," he breathed at last.
All he got back was a smile.
Slowly, carefully, he went to sit next to his fellow Toa, looking out towards the other end of the room, not meeting the brown eyes that wouldn't tear away from his head; he breathed in deeply, barely producing a sound as he inhaled and exhaled.
They could still hear the entire world erupting with life far into the night just outside.
Forgetting them long enough to allow them some peace.
Without a single word, Kopaka lifted his legs to lay them across Pohatu's lap, pulling himself onto it and letting his nose sink into the crook of his neck; the other let him, only loosely draping his arms around him, tired grin going unnoticed.
He shifted himself to easy himself down across the length of the cot, dragging his fellow Toa along. He laid both their bodies on their sides, feeling his embrace be replicated onto him.
They adjusted for a moment - their grips, their positions, until they were fully, completely comfortable.
They'd fallen asleep on each other so many times in these bodies, whether it be in search for comfort or just because they were too exhausted to realize it, that they knew how they felt almost too well. They knew how it felt to hold something like this so close; how the texture of their skin differed, the weight of each other's hair on their arms, the warmth or chill of their breaths, the strange scents they couldn't get rid of, the way they each jolted depending on whether they were having a dream or a nightmare, the direction each preferred to turn towards, how long it took them to fall asleep.
They were so used to it all that barely noticed any of that.
They just held, having already drifted off.
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