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The first time Axia hears about his father he's around the age of seven or eight - he doesn't remember - and the first time he hears about his father in his life is the day his father dies.
It's broadcasted all over Eden's news channels, all over radios, all through the interfaces of airships people choose to skip over or ignore, but Axia looks on. Looks on to the flashing Krone on a screen piled with tabs of fire and crashes and blood and smoke, puts the puzzle pieces together when he turns back to hear a scrabbling behind him - his cats are blind to the world, but his mother's leaning against a chair weakly. Her eyes are bloodshot, crimson lines clinging onto the whites like lazy strokes from an artist never meant to be erased out, and for the first time in his life:
Axia feels fear.
-
The girls say it's cute, but he only smiles and looks away. The boys get together behind his back to snort, but he only turns a deaf ear. He knows it's a long way down Eden's most prestigious university, and it's a longer way down being someone who takes up the Introduction to Aircrafts and Pilots classes just for the information. There's no way he wants to step close to a real-life one - no way he wants to deprive his family of the only other one they have left in the outside world.
That is, until Lauren rolls around.
Red-headed, pompous, hair-tied-over-his-shoulder Lauren Iroas, who is everything Axia likes in a person and who is everything Axia undeniably dislikes in a person. He's loud and fun and incredible to talk to, but he's risky and heinous and selfless, too. Axia hangs around him just enough to know he wants to become a fighter, and just enough to know nothing further.
It's on those field days with Lauren that makes his heart pump a little faster - when his teachers are instructing him on how to pilot a craft - memorize the controls in his amygdala - and Lauren pops up behind him each and every time, without fail.
"When we graduate," he says, each time. "You should be my partner."
And because being a partner entails being a pilot and therefore being responsible for a life outside of his own, Axia wants to deny it. He barely knows this fiery-headed guy and he barely knows his own strength and he barely knows that he's not responsible for anyone other than him, but he denies it each time. And each time, Lauren continues to ask.
It should become a hassle , he's thinking to himself one day, under the shade of a tree and his scarf wrapped up to his nose. But it doesn't.
It never does.
-
Axia sees his first aircraft outside of a field day when he's gone to pay his respect to a man he's never known.
The grave has just become a little rotten with moss and vines, as graves often do when they're in the middle of a forest in Eden's otherwise swamped city and there's parts of landing crashes scattered through the area that Axia never studies for himself. He's long past mourning for a father he never had and he's long past counting the heroics of a man he never knew on the back of his hand and he's long past the newer grave that rests contentedly beside said man's. Axia puts his head to the ground and sighs life into it for a second before he's coming back up.
"Mom," he says, softly, even though he's in a place where no one else should be, and where no one else can hear him. "I graduated today. Are you happy?"
Are you happy? Even though all I studied uptil now never had a chance to help me save you?
A low hum passes by the wind. Axia looks up.
Wide, and silver. It's a sight he undeniably wishes to forget.
-
Lauren, despite the short-term usage of his brain, graduates with flying colors in law and tactical subjects - he announces at their graduation that he's going to become a freedom fighter. Axia vaguely wonders if that's the new terminology they're using for their otherwise lazy, be-hated cops.
Axia, with the brain usage of a normal person, graduates with the proper grades as well. He's not as sure-fire quick with deciding his future in front of a crowd of tired 20-year olds as much as Lauren had been, but he bows nonetheless and vows, as they all do, to help make Eden a better place.
Barely notices Lauren staring him down by his side as he steps down from the podium, barely registers the fingers tracing over his knuckles until he's already running.
-
Lauren makes him run to a remote court on the back of their educational institute and makes him stand there. The hand in his goes unnoticed, but there's a visceral thrumming through Axia's veins as the boy in front of him smiles, dumb and big and a little cute - he inwardly wants to look away. The skin touching his is warm, and nice, because it's winter and they're all graduating in winter and -
Nobody's held his hand like this ever since his mother had passed away.
-
Axia rejects Lauren's plea to become his personal pilot for the umpteenth time, that day.
-
"Axia-kun, was it?"
"Oliver-sensei." Axia bows in due respect in front of the smiling, familiar teacher. "I did not expect to see you...here?"
Oliver looks around. In accordance to Axia's words, he can deem it a little strange to see a biology professor sauntering around an aircraft mechanic stop.
"I was just passing by, you see," he opts to say.
Axia nods even though he knows it's a terrible lie. "It's nice to see you again, Professor," he says, truthfully. "Your extra notes turned out to be a big help in the reverse mechanism pointers part of the exam."
"I'm glad." Oliver looks around, again, clearly a little curious. "Though, I have to ask...I thought you'd become a pilot with that range of talent you have, Axia-kun. What are you doing in a place like this?"
Axia grins, waving his hand dismissively in response.
“Nothing much. This interests me more than the flying aspect of it.” He's pretty sure he looks stupid like this - upholding a bare belief in front of someone that obviously sees through it all.
There’s a twinkle in Oliver’s eye he barely misses when he’s looking back up at his teacher, and his hands curl a little into themselves in response to his gaze.
Oliver simply smiles. “It’s alright, Axia-kun. I’ll see you around.”
-
There's one thing that Axia notices throughout this, and it's that a lot of people responsible for aircraft-flying in general pass around his area a lot. Whether it be owed to his extensive knowledge about internal wiring or his dexterous fingers prodding controls to correction in a few swoops or so, he doesn't think there's much to attribute to it. It isn't an overnight thing, but Axia's small handishop becomes one of the hotspots for pilots and their air-fighters to drop by in a limited amount of time.
There's another thing Axia notices then, too: Lauren never comes to pay him a visit.
-
It's a little weird to worry about something like this, he's musing to himself. About some guy that used to pester him. Maybe he never ended up turning into the sort of freedom fighter he used to yell about so passionately. Maybe he never become one here. Maybe he took the first flight out to Eden the first chance he got after graduating and jumped off to another plane of existence to mark his own searing-hot brand of existence there, instead of here. And maybe he’s doing alright - enrolling in some high-end police academies, saving people foreign to his blood, thinking about guys that aren’t Axia and aren’t aircraft mechanics and didn’t throw down everything they’re capable of in a drain for underlying fear of things that should have never existed.
He’s probably doing fine, out there.
He’s probably doing great.
-
The first time Axia witnesses an accident in his short career he doesn’t expect them to bring the pilot in with them.
It’s a relatively small Camus 6000, enough to house a single pilot and a few necessities and nothing more, shaped into something similar like an egg-like sphere and roughly the size of one of those larger cars that are so rare in places like Eden. The metal door is busted - there’s a few sparks crackling on the hinges outside and there’s three more people jumping off the vehicle that’s conveniently dropped it off in front of the raven-haired boy’s shop. They’re all dressed in doctor’s wear - one of them a little different, blue hair sporting his head messily and a blue creature scrambling its merry way out of his lab-coat pockets when he hops forward, slapping his big hands on Axia’s shoulders before he’s ready to be intercepted.
“Krone-kun, right?” He says.
Axia nods, eyes wide. The man looks a little maniacal, a little unhinged. There’s sweat flowing down his brow like an unmarked waterfall and his fingers are trembling, just slightly, against the material of his shirt.
“Good,” he says, and his tongue juts out to lick his lips as if he’s trying to make up for his possible lost sanity. “Good. We need you.”
Admittedly, Axia is not too good under pressure. He's good at tests because they're predictable. He's good at field- tests because there's no real threat of a person's lifeline hanging onto a thread when he busts open doors and messes with the wires. He's good at almost anything because there's no real fear in it - and right now there's a shit ton of it.
A shit ton, because the crazy lab-coat guy that's introduced himself as Leos Vincent stares at him tremble in front of his tools for a minute in confusion, and there's nothing he can do about the curious gaze that's hitting his back until Leos Vincent walks forward himself.
Axia thinks he's going to get yelled at. Worse, get physically manhandled into the field to help the poor pilot stuck in his Camus, and be subjected to his wanton-screaming-for-his-life as the life-support connections of his pilot suit fade away into black space before Axia can do anything whatsoever about it.
But Leos doesn't do any of these things. He simply stands next to the mechanic, pulls out a carton of cigarettes of an unknown brand, and the little creature promptly holds a lighter in its little hands in a practiced motion as he lights it.
Hands it over to Axia. "Take it."
Axia physically recoils. "No." Too abrupt, a little rude. "No, I'm sorry. I-I can't."
Leos raises a brow. Axia looks away nervously, and then takes the cigarette from his hands. Stares at it for a moment before placing it in his mouth.
The noises outside of shouting doctors trying to stabilize the pilot inside the airship threaten to disrupt his drag, but Axia successfully inhales an incoherent amount of nicotine down his lungs before his chest lets him breathe normally, and then Leos is taking back the cigarette from between his fingers without a second word. Axia watches the smoke disperse from his breath as he exhales, watches his own fingers calm down, head a little lighter.
“Good?”
Axia nods. “I’ll go grab some things. Vincent-san-”
“Drop the formalities . No need to be polite.” He looks annoyed. The little creature is trying its best to wave at him from on top of his shoulder. He's taking an inconsiderate puff from the cigarette before dropping it to the ground, stubbing it under his shoes.
Axia vaguely thinks about fire protocol in work spaces. “Thank you. Please do your best.”
Powering down the aircraft isn’t the hard part. It’s easily enough to break in to the external wiring, and Axia’s barely pulled out a couple before the machine lets out a disgruntled hum in a signal to shut down its system, startling the doctors behind him. Leos doesn’t give a reaction. He huffs on his newly-lit cigarette as he kneels down next to Axia, inspecting the stretched-out wires in his hand as the raven-haired boy gets up, skipping towards the hunched door immediately as the flying sparks of electricity die down on the hinges. It’s still battered, the handle having had broken down - Axia doesn’t know if he has the sheer strength to pull it apart by himself - and then Leos is getting up, grabbing his arm.
Axia jolts. He turns to look at the older man with blinking eyes, and Leos places his little creature down on his palm.
“Mameneko,” he says, with a hint of adoration in his voice that makes Axia’s brain almost short-circuit. “He looks useless, but he’ll help.”
The creature - Mameneko - is holding something in his little arms that looks like an odd spear. Axia peers at it with confusion, until he flops over to the broken-down handle and turns back to look at the two of them, as if expecting them to take note of his every move.
Axia doesn’t know what overcomes him to do so, but he purses his lips and gives the little thing a thumbs-up.
Mameneko visibly brightens, his flipper-feet flapping excitedly as he turns back to the door, and then raises his spear. Axia wonders what the toothpick-like weapon is capable of before he strikes it in the miniscule gap between the door and the wall, and then twists it. The loud, familiar noise of metal-on-metal scrapes through the air - the doctors behind them groan as Axia slaps his hands to his ears with a hiss. Leos looks all too comfortable.
Mameneko manages to drive apart the door with little effort.
Everyone in the shop stares at the little creature.
"Leos-san," Axia says, in awe. "How is your pet so strong?"
"Oh no, it's the spear," Leos corrects, glasses fogging up from the smoke that travels out from the compartment of the vehicle as Mameneko hops away, landing on Axia's shoulder unceremoniously. "Mame-chan gets squashed easily."
Axia blanks, a hand coming up to pat at the creature's head proactively for a second before he cradles him into his hands, and gives him over.
"I see," he says. "Well-" He turns back to the airship, and the doctors uneasily waiting for him to go in and help with the life-support-suit. And possibly more internal processions that they're not responsible for. "Thank you. I-"
Leos waves a hand dismissively, an odd smile on his face. "Go on."
-
"Axia-kun," Oliver's voice is gentle. "What happened?"
Axia's staring at him. And his companion. Suddenly feeling overdressed in his formal suit and tie, he asks, "You two….know each other?"
Leos, wearing the same lab-coat from the morning over a simple black shirt, is sporting the biggest, smug grin on his features. "And would that be a problem?"
Axia shakes his head instantly, holding up both hands in a vague apology. "No, no. Just surprised."
Oliver squints at him, and then his partner. The restaurant's dim lights makes it seem like he's some sort of interrogator that's stumbled upon an unexpected chain, and Axia shifts in his seat uncomfortably. If this he does under Oliver's visible eye, or because of remembering the morning's events, he can't say.
Leos turns to Oliver, the smile never dying down. Mameneko is too busy balancing on a rim, trying his best to not fall over in his glass of champagne to notice any of the tension in the air.
"We met this morning."
"Oh." Oliver visibly relaxes for a minute, and then blinks back to surprise. "Wasn't there an accident near Axia-kun's site today? That you were in charge of overseeing?"
"Yup!" Leos brightens. "We really had a fun time with that one, didn't we?!" He's progressively getting louder every passing second of Oliver's sheer horror, reaching over to slap a reddening Axia's shoulder. It resounds in the hall so loud a couple customers turn over from their food to stare at them.
Axia shrinks. Oliver's looking at him with a worried expression, but tightens and lets out a sigh. " Do you want to talk about it, Axia-kun?"
"No, not really," Axia responds immediately. He looks around as a reflex, trying his best to will back the red rims of his eyes. "Maybe later, Professor."
Leos huffs. "No fear in talking about your heroics, I think!" He picks up Mameneko by the collar from his champagne glass - and it looks like he'd succeeded in taking a sip or two. Drowsy, falling on his flippers on the palm of the scientist's hand, he curls up around the nearest finger and falls asleep on it. "Mame-chan - " he pauses, moving close to the little creature's head, "was TRULY helpful today, WAS HE NOT?"
Mameneko jumps awake from his finger in response to the loud noise, immediately standing up to slam a tiny hand to his forehead in a salute.
Oliver snorts. Axia peers at him curiously.
"So what is he, anyways?" The mechanic asks, inching his own hand towards him. Mameneko gleefully jumps over from Leos' hand to Axia's, immediately cuddling up to his index finger in a way that would suggest that he's realized that the owner of it isn't attuned to scaring people awake.
"An experiment," Leos says, watching Axia pet him with caution. "And, don't you have better things to ask?"
"Oh, yes," he peers up, shooting looks at both adults one by one. "How do you two know each other?"
"Highschool dilf."
"Overactive science kid from highschool."
They stare at each other.
"Dilf?" Oliver questions.
"Moving on."
-
There's a hyperactive energy thrumming through his veins when he gets home, and Axia slams the door to his room behind him and then leans against it, eyes staring up at the wall with a blank expression.
There's a thousand things in his brain and there's a thousand things in his heart, and it's uncomfortable and drowsy and weird. And his chest is tight. And there's a trembling in his fingers that he's been terminally at a loss to calm.
He's just gotten used to the scraping pain on the low of his back when his phone vibrates, a faint ringing piercing through his ears as his hand digs through the pockets of his jeans, pulling it out half-heartedly. The bright screen feels blinding in the otherwise dark of his room, and he barely makes himself read the recipient before swiping across and holding it to his ear.
"Hello?" He asks, wearily.
"Axia-kun," comes a familiar voice, the honeyed deepness a comfortable hum in his ears. "Are you alright? You looked a little out of it when we were dropping you off."
"Professor," Axia mumbles. The day's events click in motion in the back of his mind, then, a record-player with an infinite-loop option no real record-player should have the audacity to have. 'No. Not really."
"Was Leos-kun scary?" There's amusement in his voice, the sort of amusement that makes Axia want to huff in contentness, too. "I have reason to believe he makes a strong first impression to anyone he encounters."
"Definitely," Axia says, a small laugh breaking way out of his throat. "I thought he was going to send me flying into that Camus as soon as I got the actual pilot out."
"If you didn't make a good first impression on your own, he might have."
"Don't scare me, Professor." Suddenly, the darkness is a little more inviting. "Yeah. Mameneko's more welcoming."
"Mameneko…." Oliver sighs on the other end of the line. "That thing can be feisty if it wants to be."
"As expected of his pet, I guess."
"Mm. Are you going to tell me what happened, today?"
"Do I have to?"
A cough on the other end.
Axia stifles a giggle. "Well, it all started when I was seven-"
" Axia -kun."
It doesn't take too long to explain. Doesn't take as long of a time to throw out all his internal turmoils and worries as it felt like when he'd been pressing his hands onto the unconscious victim's chest, feeling for a pulse beyond shitty pilot suits and their shitty material. Doesn't feel as terribly long as when he'd pulled them out, detaching the shitty helmet to give them the ounce of oxygen needed to plug off the life-support tube from behind safely. Doesn't feel as long as it did watching the doctors shuffle inside the cramped space, taking the body out of his shivering fingers themselves.
Oliver is silent, for a minute. Or two. "What you did today," he says, slowly, "Was very commendable and brave, Axia-kun."
"I didn't feel brave."
"That's the point." Oliver sounds reassuring, but the cobwebs in Axia's brain only expand more within the confines. Free arm wrapped around his knees and the scraping sensation from before just a dull pulse into the skin of his back, now, there's things he feels like he doesn't want to be capable of, anymore. He doesn't think he can sleep tonight, either. "You didn't realize it, because you were in the heat of the moment. But it was dangerous, and no coward could've done what you did effortlessly."
"I wish I was a coward, then, Professor," the black-haired boy murmurs under his breath. "Did Hakase tell you anything about the pilot?"
The professor doesn't reply instantly, possibly thinking. "Mm. Iroas-kun, was it?"
"Iroas?" Axia squints, the name a familiar memory inside his head. "Is that his name?"
"Could be Iro-has." A shuffling noise, and then, a realizing ah.
"Professor?"
"He's in the hospital, so you don't have to worry," Oliver says, "He's stable. What's frightening is that he graduated along your batch, Axia-kun. That's really young."
Axia frowns. "So in his early twenties?" The mechanic does remember the body being lighter than he'd expected - but he's also harnessed a lot of raw strength through lifting up heavy metal for the past few years to really note a significant difference. "I wonder who. There weren't a lot of people in the aircraft-specific classes." Not Lauren. Lauren's probably not even in Eden.
"Mhm. A redhead. Looks like that boy that used to be attached to your hip the whole day."
Axia can sense a teasing lilt when he needs to. He sighs. "Oli-sensei, there were a lot of redheads that year. Remember Pata-nee?"
"Paterson?" Oliver chuckles. "She was a good kid. I heard she's in training to become a bodyguard."
Axia lets out an ah of his own. "She was always crazy strong in karate."
"You boys had nothing against her," The professor reminisces. "You boys probably don't have anything right now, either."
"For sure." Axia grins, the wood of his door a comfortable headrest. He shuffles a bit, knees pressing to his chest, the oversized coat around his shoulders a subtle warmth in the otherwise air-conditioned room. "Any luck with the first name?"
"Didn't I mention it?" He can see the frown in his mindframe. The one Oliver used to make in class whenever he'd forgotten to go over subtopics in class. "Uh. Holdon."
"Okay." Axia's eyes are droopy. There's shuffling on the other end again, so he takes a second to drag back the phone to check the time. Not that late. He's probably tired from today, that's all.
"Got it," Oliver mumbles. "Iroas."
"Yeah."
"Iroas….Lauren?"
Axia blinks. "Huh?"
"Ro-ren." He pauses. "That's how you pronounce it, right? No Eden-ly pronunciation or something?"
"Lauren Iroas?"
An affirming hum.
"Lauren. Like the redhead that clung to me."
"I wouldn't know that, Axia-kun," Oliver says. "I would've remembered someone if they were close."
And then it hits him: sitting under the shade of the tree in the back-yard of the school. Axia munching on his sandwich, Lauren a few feet away.
"You should take your studies seriously, you know?" Axia huffs. "Biology's not that easy, even if Oli-sensei's good at teaching it."
"Yeah, well," Lauren replies. "You're the one that's gonna be driving me, so why should I?"
-
The hospital's not that far from where Axia lives. He asks for the address quickly and pulls his coat back on even quicker, stumbling out the door of his apartment room with nothing but his half-dead phone in his hands and a piece of crumpled paper in his fist with hastily-scribbled numbers. The wind is as strong as when he'd left the restaurant from before - but that does not disrupt the single looping thought running like a freight train through his head: He has to see Lauren. He doesn't know why. But he has to.
It's a ten minute walking distance, but Axia turns it into less by sprinting his way, the automated doors barely sliding open before he's at the counter of the ER.
"Hey," he says, not at all as casual as he wants to be, "I'm a friend of Lauren Iroas."
-
The nurse in charge of looking after Lauren looks at him a little warily before she lets him inside. Axia doesn't exactly have the thought process in his brain to be more aware of his surroundings - so he doesn't notice her concerned looks behind his back before he enters the room.
He doesn't know what he's expecting to see. Lauren, yes. Lauren, banged up and probably on oxygen-support or something. He's subconsciously prepared for anything, but at the same time he's not.
Lauren looks…different. A bit different from the hyperactive no-brainer from Eden's top university, with his crimson hair longer, features more mature, body a little more built. His hair is spread out on the stark-white pillow like a shitty halo around his head, eyebrows knitted together in an uncomfortable expression. His arms are bigger than he remembers, and there's unfamiliar cuts on his face and skin, but otherwise he's completely the skinny, tall annoyance from before.
(Probably still shorter than him, Axia muses.)
"Lauren," Axia says, beside himself. His voice comes out as a hushed whisper, but the red-head's closed eyes flicker, fingers twitching. Apparently he'd not exactly been asleep.
Or probably just a light sleeper.
Lauren's peering at him from his half-lidded eyes, Axia can tell. His hands are on his sides, still and listless like the rest of his body. The only motion in the room is their breathing.
"Hey." His voice is small.
Axia wonders if pretending to be mute is the better option here, for a second. "Hey yourself."
The edges of Lauren's lips lift up. "Same old Axia."
Axia relaxes. He doesn't know why. But he relaxes, just a bit. Walks forward, just a bit. Just until Lauren's a little closer, the sweat on his forehead a little more visible. There's a washcloth in a small tub next to him, and he vaguely wonders if he should hold it to his head in place of the nurse, there and then.
Lauren can sense his scrambled thoughts.
"What are you getting distracted for?" He grumbles, and then coughs. The black-haired boy jolts, and stares at him. "There. That's better."
Axia scoffs. "You're still the same, too."
The red-head grins. "Obviously. Pay attention to me when you're here for me, got that?"
"Right," Axia says, heart thumping a little faster at the way he phrases the intention for his visit. "And now that I've seen you, I should leave."
"No, wait-" Lauren retorts immediately, eyes going wide as he attempts to sit up - there's a faint crack and he hisses, which turns on Axia's fight or flight instinct. Scrambling forward to grab the shorter man by the arm, he forces him back onto the pillows.
"Don't make me do unnecessary things for you, Lauren," Axia says, irritably. "Just sit still and recover."
"What if I don't want to?"
"Then a visit from Professor Evans should make do."
Lauren immediately shuts up, the grin on his face ebbing away. "Still on that threat?"
"Still works, doesn't it?" Axia can't help the grin of his own. It's all too familiar, all too reminiscent of their university days. "Like a charm."
"True," Lauren agrees. "Doesn't mean you should abuse it."
"Shut up, before I give you a reason to land right back here after your discharge," Axia says, a hint of fondness in his tone that he realizes all too late. Hopes Lauren didn't catch it.
"Uhuh."
-
The hospital visit is short, but it makes up for everything inside Axia's head and it makes up for all the major concerns. He's still confused about the situation and he's still confused about Lauren taking a Camus to fly on his own and he's still confused about how Lauren managed to get by all those years without a single word out in a place like Eden. Questions all due their own time, their own space.
-
Lauren gets discharged a few days later. He's a fast healer, and the scratch on his face ebbs away into a nicely faded scar on the blunt of his cheek - something he takes an odd pride in, something he manages to show off any chance he gets. Axia thinks he's just showing off how reckless he can get. There's no real merit here.
But he's glad. Inwardly, just a little.
He's glad he's fine.
-
Lauren drops by Axia's shop soon.
"Nice place you got here," he says, obviously miffed at how to start a casual conversation now that this is their first real interaction after years of graduating. Their first real interaction that doesn't exactly involve Lauren as a beat up kid pleading for a pilot to aid his future dream to become a cop. The first real interaction that doesn't involve Axia pushing him away like he'd done so hundreds of times.
"Nice, it is," Axia agrees. He doesn't look up from polishing his miniature model of a prototype airship. "It was even nicer without you around, you know?"
"Yeah, yeah," Lauren scoffs. "What's it gonna take for you to say you enjoy my splendid company, hm?"
"You tell me." Axia places the model down over the countertop, gloved hands brushing over in a small, fluid movement.
And it's in this specific moment that Lauren chooses to study him. Axia can tell from the corner of his eye the way he's looking at him and purposefully keeps his head down, eyelashes a small flurry of motion on his cheeks as he nervously looks around for something else to polish.
"You became prettier over the years I didn't see you." Lauren, blunt as ever.
Axia feels himself reddening, and coughs. "Yeah? You got just a little uglier."
He turns to look at Lauren, who's clutching a hand to his chest.
"Axia-kun's become so rude, too, huh?" He says, without an ounce of any real spite. "That's good. I like fierce people."
Axia wonders about the several ways to have him end up on a hospital bed, again.
-
Lauren asks to see the broken down Camus he'd flown one foot near to hell in, and Axia is all too happy to show it to him.
It's somewhere in the warehouse from when Axia had more or less thrown it in, as far away from his eyes as possible before shutting the door behind him with a loud bang of old wood slamming on its hinges. For a moment, the grinning solidness of his agreement wavers from his heart as he stands in front of those same hinges. Lauren’s standing behind him, so he shouldn’t waste his time - but there’s a sudden cacophony of uncomfortable feelings flowing down his veins to his throat:
There’s a chance Lauren wouldn’t have been here at all. If Leos hadn’t instilled the minutest confidence in him that day…
He shakes his head, and pulls on the hinges.
And it’s right there. Not a part of some void, now. Just a scrap of useless metal taking precious space. But Lauren seems to light up at the very sight of his useless, broken-down airship, walking towards it with slow, sure steps. He runs a hand over the cracked hood, fingers brushing on the broken glass of the front window carefully before he pulls away, and sighs.
“Thanks, Axia,” he says, turning back, and there’s a sincerely warm look in his eyes.
"What for?" Axia asks, only a little nervous. One or his hands have come up to rub his arm in what could be a sheepish, self-comforting manner before he realises he's looking away from Lauren, and it's only then does he also realise that Lauren's looking at him with a sort of look in his eyes he probably can't have it in him to hold back.
"You know," Lauren says, even though he doesn't know. Laughing under his breath, a small sound: "Just for keeping it. Thanks."
"Is it important?"
Axia turns back to see the redhead's expression glazed over as he looks at the aircraft, a hand hovering in the air unconsciously, as if he wants to touch it again.
"Yeah. Do you think this can be fixed?"
The mechanic blinks. "Well…"
Lauren smiles, even though it looks a little forced. "Don't worry about it, though. Just a passing question."
How can I not worry? Is what Axia wants to say, but he holds his tongue as the shorter man walks over, slamming a hand onto his shoulder and keeping it firm. Axia stares.
"You saved my life," he says, then. "I can't ask for more."
"Even though I know you want to?" Axia says, bluntly.
Lauren blinks, and then snorts. "Yeah. Even if I want to."
-
Axia tries. Really, he does.
He spends the next month with his shop closed down - he has enough inheritance and enough savings to live decades of years off comfortably, so he thinks a month or two can't be that bad. A couple of his regulars drop by to ask what he's up to, and he always smiles and waves and tells them it's just a little side project, don't worry about it, the shop will open again soon. And the regulars always nod and smile on their own and give him their blessings, and Axia takes those words and pushes them down under his chest in a small box of velvet no one else knows about.
Hands greasy, blackened by oil and substances and sparks of fire - every day work is nothing compared to fixing down a shitty, broken down Camus 6000. There's new sorts of airships that've been released ever since Lauren's original one crashed, but convincing him to let go is like trying to convince a chihuahua to stop barking at a potted plant. So Axia tucks his words under the sleeve of his shirts and gets to work like any other friend would do - and here's where he questions if he's even qualified enough to do this.
Are they friends? Lauren and him? Lauren used to pester him, yes. Lauren used to be the only one that took an interest in him outside of biology professors and their crazy mad scientist partners and the sweet, red-haired insanely-strong kid down the hall in the classroom opposite to the university art room. Lauren is still the only one that insists on talking to him without the necessary honorifics and Lauren is the only one now that treats him like one, so maybe they are.
Friends, he means. And Axia doesn't really mind helping his friend.
-
It's a broken-down deal that if Axia can't fix the aircraft, Lauren will have to invest in a new one. If Axia can fix it, well. He'll keep it.
And so Axia sticks to his word. He's not called one of the smartest aircraft mechanics in their humble area for no reason - it takes time, and it takes patience, but Lauren is there to see it when the old Camus breaks into a rumbling start-up and Axia is all too happy to see the way his face lights up, the peach of his cheeks against the pale skin a warm sight in the dead of night, reflected only by dim-warehouse light.
He looks away. Why'd he have to think about that? And then back again when Lauren scrambles out of the aircraft with an excited expression on his face.
"Can we take her for a ride?" He asks, trying to keep his emotion down.
Axia thinks he looks like an over-excited rabbit. "Sure. Are you gonna drive?"
"Obviously," Lauren replies, confidently bringing a fist up to his chest in response. "Get in, Axia."
The mechanic snorts, staying still in his place and bringing up his arms to cross over his chest with a lazy smile on his features. "Is it even big enough for the both of us?"
He doesn’t get a reply - his friend stuffing himself inside the vehicle without a second word, waving at Axia from inside to follow.
Rolling his eyes, he does.
-
It's...comfortable.
As comfortable as it can get for a one-and-a--half person seater aircraft, but it doesn't take long for them to realize that if one of them sits cross-legged and leaning towards a specific direction, he easier to make space for the one behind. The Camus is littered with small monitor screens and wires and a few packs of snacks put carelessly on the dashboard in front of Lauren's face, where he can easily lean in to grab a chip or two with his mouth. Axia prefers to extend his hands forward, thank you very much.
It's a good day for flight, as well. It doesn't take too much kicking-off or blustering from the vehicle to thrust itself into the air like any other normal aged model of its kind, and soon enough they're high up in the air, wind and clouds bustling by like people on a busy street.
And Axia stares. He stares outside of the front window with the sort of awe in his expression even he himself doesn't register. Yes, he's been in the air a few times through public transport airplanes, so he's not too nervous or not as jittery as first-time pilots he's read so many reports of.
But there's a sort of personal serenity in this that he's never known. A sort of intimacy in a small space like this, and he would've felt even more immersed were it not for the redhead in front of him munching on his crisps.
He's probably doe-eyed, too, with the way Lauren turns back slightly to register his reaction and only freezes a bit in response.
Blinks up at him, and then lets out a breathy laugh. "You're looking enamoured."
"I am," Axia half-mumbles truthfully, eyes not leaving the sight even when Lauren's shifting back into his seat, pulling the lever just a slight but more upwards. There's a faint rumbling in the engine that makes Axia blink out of his stupor, before he realizes they're going higher. And he's not technically afraid of heights - cannot show a weakness like this anyways when Lauren is around, but one of his arms immediately latch around Lauren's, holding onto it with an inch of nervousness that turns them both quieter.
A beat passes. "Axia."
Axia's not trembling, but he might as well. "Hm?"
"Do you," Lauren enunciates slowly, carefully, like he's afraid the black-haired boy would jump out of the aircraft at a moment's notice if he goes too fast, "want to take a crack at flying this thing?"
-
The first thing they teach you in flight class is obviously not the mechanics or the wiring or the internal reactions and consequences of disastrous situations or anything like that. They divide the class into even pairs and push them into the field of the university-grounds, doing trust-fall exercises until each and every student has hit dirt at least once.
"Because that's how they teach you," Oliver had told him one day, when he'd come to his office all battered and muddy and stupefied, "That your airship will requires the same sort of trust any one in a precarious situation will need to place on it when the time comes for it."
-
Axia wants to say no. He almost wants to smack Lauren on the head and berate him for even asking again, after all those years of begging and denial. But there's a soft feeling In his chest, now, and the memories of staying up to learn controls and configurations despite his own self-induced forthcoming floods back into his amygdala, and he wants to reach out.
For once in his life, he wants to reach out.
Even though Lauren is annoying, even though Lauren is cheeky and intolerable and weird. He's reaching his hand out, warm eyes staring into his own. The sky is empty, the only companions by their side the whispers of passing clouds.
"I'll help you," he says. "You're smart, anyways. So you're gonna learn quickly."
For once in his life, Axia thinks he can trust someone in the air like this.
Nodding slightly, he pushes his arm out, until his hand is resting on top of Lauren's.
He smirks. "Teach me, then, Iroas-sensei."
It doesn't take long for him to fly.
Obviously, it doesn't, being a pilot-prodigy from birth. His hands wrap around the controls perfectly and his eyes scan the information laid out in front of him as casually as reading from a newspaper, and slowly Lauren's hands on top of his - guiding him, slowing him down to reflect on his every move - fade away, their touch a ghost-like whisper in his ears as he gains control of himself, gains control of the airship.
Looks at it like it's his own, runs his hands over it like it's his own. The vehicle seems to be hum back with every murmured action Axia recites under his breath before he executes it, and soon it only becomes a matter of becoming one.
Becoming one with the air, becoming one with this.
And it doesn't take too long.
-
When Lauren drops him home that night Axia lingers at his front-door for a few seconds instead of just wishing him goodnight and sauntering in after a long day. His coat is fluttering in the cold winter-night wind and his hair is definitely a shitty mess by now, but when Lauren stands a few feet away from him with his hands dug into the pockets of his own coat and a glimmer in his eyes Axia's never seen before, he knows there's a subtle change in the air around them.
He almost doesn't know what to say, either. "Thanks for today, Lauren."
The policeman smiles, an attractive curve of his lips Axia's determined to look away from. "Thanks to you too, Axia. I hope we can fly together again."
Axia doesn't say a word. It's funny, how it feels a little more natural like this.
It's funny, realizing it's fine to be a little enamoured when Lauren does not look like he's dying to ask, anymore.
-
It becomes a routine. More or less, it becomes a morning routine where Axia makes a bumbling request to borrow Lauren's Camus, and go on solo single-row runs before coughing and making an excuse to go back home instantly, but this sort of cycle isn't bad for any of them. Lauren likes the child-like excitement Axia can barely cover up on his expression every time he steps in. Axia likes the freedom, the slow serenity of being one with the clouds.
Sometimes, he thinks whether his father felt like this. And it's weird to be empathetic towards a guy he'd never known his entire life, but sometimes he thinks he gets it. The calmness, the tingles of effervescent warmth crawling under his skin and flowing down his veins every time he boards the aircraft. Sometimes he thinks his father had the right idea - abandoning human life to become one with the clouds. Maybe if he wasn't…
He wants to yell it sometimes. Like, dad, are you watching? Or something along the lines of, I don't know why you gave me a reason to be scared.
Or something considerate, something believable, like I shouldn't have forced myself to comply to my own fears. You never cared about me before, so why should I care about repeating your mistakes?
Sometimes Axia doesn't think at all. And it's always infinitely better, then.
-
It doesn't take Lauren asking him again to make Axia clench his fists one day on his own.
"If you still need me to," he says, "I can be your pilot. Okay?"
It doesn't take a nanosecond for Lauren to burst into the widest grin any of them has seen on him their entire lives. "Sure." He extends a hand out, watches Axia expectantly.
"Nice to be working with you," he says then, just a little reminiscent of his younger days, practicing mock speeches day by day and over and over again. "Partner."
Axia gives him a small smile of his own.
"Partner," he repeats, liking the way it rolls off his tongue as easily as anything else. "It's settled, then."
-
He likes being Lauren's partner. He's loud and cranky and weird and not anything like Axia remembers from before, but maybe it's because he's grown. Maybe he's just grown to like Lauren for being Lauren, and it's a weird idea conceptually, but away from the depths of his brain to actually consider it. He's lost enough of his time worrying. It's Okay, Now.
And he doesn't dislike it either. Lauren's overwhelming laughter, affections and words. He doesn't dislike the way Lauren places an arm over his shoulder despite being the shorter one. He doesn't dislike the way Lauren consistently keeps a look out for him during company dinners. It doesn't take a lot for him to like him, and it's weird.
Weirder than most.
But also good.
-
Oliver looks at him sometimes with a blank expression on his face. It's concerning, but Axia already has some vague ideas on what's it about. He doesn't ask.
-
It does get obvious, though. With the way Lauren stutters on his words sometimes, now. With the way Axia has to rub the back of his neck sheepishly whenever their skin touches. It's obvious and weird and a little funny - the way they act around each other, as if they're explosives ready to burst anytime soon. Axia does his job and takes Lauren to his callings. Lauren does his job and stay still as Axia steers his way into new territories as he's been instructed to, each and every time.
But it does get obvious, and it does get a little weird. And Axia thinks maybe this is what real friendship is like, anyways, because he's never had one before - visiting each other on off days, being together on on days. Laying down next to each other, phones in hands, quiet bickering under the otherwise blanketing silence of the room. The soft, unintentional touching of their skin, the way Lauren knows just where to trace his fingers onto Axia's wrist to make him relax against his own will. The way Axia knows just as well where to crook his own fingers on the small of Lauren's back enough to make it hurt.
Just enough. And there's been a lot of first times here and there and there's been a lot of first times with Lauren, specifically, that he doesn't register nor anticipate nor realize, but at some point everyone other than him seem to get the point. And maybe he realizes he's just too afraid to get said point himself.
He's already left behind enough. Already disregarded his own methodology and already discarded his own family in favor of a new one - and here the professor tells him that no, he's lost his own family. He's only trying to make a new one, only trying to survive.
It's a little hard to believe it.
But it wouldn't hurt to try, he thinks.
Looking at Lauren, the hair tied over his shoulder. The goofy grin on his handsome, boyish features. Arms crossed over his chest, oozing the sort of confidence Axia has never seen for himself in his life, before. The sort of confidence he would kill for, would do anything for. He wants to cling onto this feeling just a little longer.
Just a little longer, he murmurs to no one in particular. It wouldn't hurt to try just a little longer.