How lovely the silence of growing things

[Kenneth Branagh]

The young man who came with Cori was understandably upset. Ken spared him one glance before returning to monitor the instrument. "Keith is a fairy. He couldn't have done it on his own so he must have gotten a soul weaver to help him. There are also spells but they're incredibly hard to pull off. They also destroy the body if they're not successful."

And if he botched the spell, his control over his golem would have been compromised. Which... might have explained how Rip was able to repossess the body. Soul weavers had complete control; their hold over whatever they infused a soul into was unbreakable. Still--impressive that someone had managed to do what only one in... perhaps a million celestials could do. And frightening. How many golems did he go through before he made one that worked?

"I think though... Cori is okay. He's not dead. There's a thread of his soul here tying him to earth, so he can find his way back. Right now he doesn't seem to be trying to come back. Look. Come here, look. See the light on this panel? See how it's pulling away from us, not coming toward us? That means he's moving away from this dimension."

[Lieve Averesch]

Ugh. Lieve curled his lip as he crossed his arms. He didn't want to think of the monster that created the golem out there to be so good at something, especially something so rare. Surely, he made himself quite useful to somebody with his golems, more than just himself. Lieve eyed Jack. The one he had gone out of his way to create a likeness of with such careful detail that it had to come from love. Or obsession. A really, really unhealthy obsession.

The more he learned about this guy, the less he wanted to know.

And was he going to come after his Cori now? His fingernails bit into his own arms. Why did he agree to this? Because Cori wanted to help. But he most certainly should have taken better care of him. It was just... he didn't think that Cori just touching Brayden Smith would put Cori into this position. Lieve swallowed hard, fighting back the panic and anger.

"...he should be tied to me..." Lieve said. As long as Lieve was here, Cori could make his way back... right? He stared at Cori with furrowed brows and concerned blue eyes filled with worry. Taking in another breath to steady himself, Lieve moved over to Ken and his contraption and he saw what he meant.

"Should we let him, though? Is that a good thing? What if he goes too far?"

[Kenneth Branagh]

"Yes..." If Lieve was soul-bound to Cori then he would be a beacon for Cori to find his way back. Ken didn't clarify in case Lieve wasn't; no sense upsetting him any further. He already looked quite agitated, and with good reason.

"Cori is doing what he thinks is right. We have to... trust his judgment. And there's no way for us to pull him back. In fact, it could be dangerous, if he's not ready to return."

They could fracture the soul, leaving Cori stranded in whatever realm he was in, while his body was put on stasis here. That was what happened to Brayden, Ken suspected; his soul was kept intact elsewhere while his body was kept here. A soul weaver would have been able to draw the soul back into the body.

Ken set the instrument down beside Cori. "We have to wait. There's nothing else to do."

[Jack Ripley]

Lieve looked about as upset as Jack felt. Well, they were sort of in the same boat now, so he couldn't blame him. And it was his fault that Lieve's friend--soulmate?--was now stuck wherever Brayden was as well.

"Anybody care for a little whiskey?" he asked, because if there was a time for the whiskey, now was it. All they were going to do was sit here and wait and Jack was already on pins and needles as it was.

Lieve shook his head, standing close to where Cori was on the bed. Jack looked over at Ken.

[Kenneth Branagh]

"No. No thank you." Ken said stiffly as he scanned Cori one last time. He wanted alcohol and Niall to stay as far apart as humanly possible and would have taken Niall over to the other apartment, if not for the fact that he felt that he should be here in case something happened. Slowly he sat on the edge of the bed to wait with Lieve, who didn't look like he wanted to go anywhere.

"Please don't give any to Niall. He—oh." Cori's hand twitched slightly. Ken grabbed the instrument but the light didn't get closer to them. Hm. He set it back down, frowning. "If Cori isn't a soul weaver," he began, and then stopped abruptly. He was thinking aloud but...

If Cori wasn't a soul weaver... what did they do next?

[Jack Ripley]

"I won't," he said. He already knew about Niall and his struggles with addiction... which honestly, mirrored his own. Funny how they had that in common. Funny in a sad way. Jack sighed heavily and was almost out the door when Ken spoke up. Slowly, Jack turned back toward him, heart growing heavier. What if Cori wasn't a soul weaver? What if he wasn't? What if he couldn't do it?

"We... then... we have to find one. Fast. Do you have somebody in mind? A lead? Anything?"

Jack couldn't take much more of this. He could feel his soul stretching far too thin for these games to go on any longer. With Keith killing Brayden every time, hurting him in the process, chipping away at him until there was nothing left of him. How long would he keep coming back to do this? Jack thought they were tied together for beautiful reasons. But it turned out to be the worst possible thing he had ever seen.

And he couldn't keep doing it. This had to be the last.

[Kenneth Branagh]

"...I was thinking about asking some of the hunters. The trophy hunters. They'd know about any rare supernaturals in the area." Ken's voice was quiet, both hands clasped and elbows resting on the tops of his thighs as he sat leaned forward. He was thinking. About the way Niall clung to him, about the way he couldn't seem to quite kick that alcohol. Another death took its toll on him as it had on all of them. But Niall was fragile in many ways—and tough in others. He withstood a lot of physical torment but the mental ones... those were his Kryptonite.

"I'd have to find them though. That means leaving here for a while. Niall... Someone has to watch him while I'm gone. And I can't..." He sighed and lightly ran a hand over his jaw, a rare sign of perturbation from Ken. "I can't tell him who I'm going to see, or where they are, or anything about them. It's safer for you all to not know about them."

That presented an obvious problem. Niall would ask and Ken didn't want to lie to him. He refused to lie to Niall but not telling him was a lie of omission. Looking up at Jack, he frowned—again breaking that stoic mask he usually wore around everyone but Niall. Ken was willing to do it for Jack and for Brayden, but not at the cost of doing harm to Niall. And he thought maybe Jack understood that, given how precious his own lover was to him. They were all trying to protect somebody.

"If you can promise me that you'll look after Niall..."

[Jack Ripley]

"I'll look after him."

He could tell Ken was having some kind of inner conflict himself. About whomever he had to meet and keeping them away from Niall. If Ken said it was safer for them all to stay away, he believed him, especially with the rare moment of emotion coming from him. Niall couldn't go with him. But once Ken walked out there, Niall would want to know where he was going. And he'd want to go. Jack had known them long enough to know that much. Niall was a bit clingy that way and he was probably all the clingier right now, with all the stress running rampant in the apartment.

"I guess this means I'm forgoing the whiskey, too," Jack sighed, closing his eyes briefly and pinching the bridge of his nose. "Which is just as well... It would break B's heart if..." His voice cracked there and he left it. Ken already knew what he was saying anyway.

"You can leave through the back patio," he said. Weren't they so lucky that they were on the ground floor? Then he looked over at Lieve, whom he had just met. Honestly, Jack didn't know him enough to trust him alone with Brayden, even if the guy's own soulmate might be in the same place. Lieve seemed to sense that because he raised his chin.

"I can watch them in here. I won't do anything and if something happens, I'll let you know."

Jack frowned, still not liking it. He didn't want to leave Brayden's side for a second, if he was honest.

[Raphael Malai]

"I can keep watch over them too," Raphael said from the door where he had been awkwardly hovering, not wanting to intrude upon what was clearly a touching and difficult moment for everyone inside. He'd come in here to check on things since everyone else was preoccupied, only to arrive part-way through the conversation.

Cori laying on the bed, still and prone, filled him with dread. But he'd heard enough to know that Cori wasn't dead, which was a relief. A small relief. Raphael smiled and edged fully into the room. He could tell Ken hadn't noticed him standing there, which spoke to his mental state at the current moment, as Ken was usually very vigilant.

"I know I'm not very useful normally but... I can do this, right? Please let me help." He looked at Ken, then at poor Professor Jack who was obviously heartbroken and just... broken in general inside. Raphael lightly touched his arm for comfort. "You can trust me with Prince Bee, Professor Jack."

[Jack Ripley]

"Jesus, fuck!"

Jack clapped a hand to his chest like an old woman. For fuck's sake! He hadn't expected the new voice right behind him. Moving away from the doorway, he dropped down onto the extravagant reading chair by the window. His nerves couldn't handle all this. He hated it so much but every part of him was screaming for that bottle of whiskey--the very alcohol he told Brayden he turned to only when things got really bad.

"Yeah," he said finally. At least he knew Raphael and that he wouldn't let Lieve do something to Brayden. Something further. It was hard to know who to trust anymore. And he certainly didn't trust that other him out there. If it hadn't been for Brayden's last wish, he wouldn't have let him come here with them.

"Yeah," he said again. "You... you can watch him."

Who loved Brayden almost as much as Jack did? Undeniably, Raphael did. He wouldn't let anything happen to him without a fight, without letting everybody know it. Meanwhile, Lieve looked somewhat aggrieved that he wasn't trusted but at the same time, resigned; he seemed to understand why and didn't seem to be taking it personally--or letting it get to him personally, anyway.

Slowly Jack got up. He brushed Raphael's shoulder and then gave it a gentle squeeze.

"Thank you." He looked over at Ken. "Please..." He didn't know what else to say. Please find somebody. Somebody to fix Brayden. Fast. He lowered his gaze, then moved out of the room to go find his half-brother and look after him, to make sure he didn't fall into the same damn pitfall that he wanted to fall into.

[Mikko Ashby]

"Everything's going to be okay." Mik swept some hair out of Rip's eyes as he held him and cradled him close to his chest, doing his best to comfort and console him. "Cori's going to fix everything, you'll see. He's powerful, right? He's a celestial, he won't fail."

And then could their lives please get back to being normal? Please? Mik felt like his life hadn't been normal since that winter festival where he'd manned the small adoption booth with his Aunt Shelby. Then Allie showed up with handsome Rip and things just...

They didn't go to hell in a hand-basket but they were damned chaotic. Only a month ago, his biggest problem was finding homes for strays. These days he felt like he didn't know where his own home was, since he was out and about so much, running around chasing Cori or chasing Rip or... just freaking out in general. He was so out of his depth that he wanted to curl up at night and sob until the dawn broke.

It was Rip who was broken now though, and Mik needed to be strong for him. He saw that Raphael guy slipping off earlier and paid him no heed, although he did get some kind of glare from Raphael's half-naked boyfriend that he didn't understand. Whatever. Mik was here for Rip—his boyfriend.

But damn.

Brayden Smith being the soul mate didn't really make him happy.

[Ripper Nightshade]

Could it ever be okay again? Rip wished things could go backwards, back, back, back before he became a murderer. Before he knew what it felt like to take a life. Despair was such an ugly feeling and he wished he had never felt it. But he knew it, in that moment when he shoved his way back to his body--such as it was--only to find that he was too late.

The other Brayden said that they could save him but he sure sounded like he didn't think it would work. The way he said he was giving the current Brayden time to say goodbye... That sounded so very final.

Through half closed eyes, Rip watched as Rhys glowered--why?--and Jack came out to sit with Niall, talking about things that didn't register in his brain. Rip saw with his eyes but he wasn't really processing anything he saw or heard. Even Mik was just a warm body but he wasn't dispelling that strange chill that had started to take hold inside.

After a while, he took Mik's hand and slid it over his chest, as if that could help defrost that sensation. "...I'm cold here, Mik. Here."

[Mikko Ashby]

Mik didn't say much to Lieve about how Brayden Smith ended up the way he was because he didn't want Lieve to over-react, but... it was bad. Rip killed him. He couldn't even begin to fathom how it felt to take a life, much less one that contained his soul mate. Was it like killing a part of himself? Like he was snuffing out his own soul?

The only thing he could do was hold on to Rip but even that didn't seem to be doing much good. Rip just... sat there and the tears kept falling from his eyes, and he was here but he wasn't present in any sense of the word. It was like he existed but... His soul was broken.

Mik's fingers curled into his chest when it was guided there. He felt the heart beating underneath, a strange rhythm that wasn't entirely human. However this body worked, it wasn't completely human.

"I know baby." He kissed the shell of the ear he whispered into. "I know it hurts. And it's going to hurt for... a long time, but you can't give up. Brayden, he... he wouldn't want you to give up, right?" Mik didn't know that for sure but he thought if he died, he wouldn't want Rip to be miserable forever. Or anyone--not just Rip. Anyone close to him.

[Ripper Nightshade]

"He wants Jack to protect me."

But it didn't feel right. To be protected when he did something so awful. He didn't know how Jack could sit in the same room with him and not want to lunge at him and kill him. Part of him wished Jack would. Part of him even wished he would yell at him, do something. But Jack didn't even look at him, like he couldn't bring himself to look at him.

"But what if Keith does it again? What if I..." He swallowed hard. The idea of killing anybody else didn't sit well with him. Even though he was created by a killer, he wasn't made to be a killer, even by the killer's own choosing. A lover, not a fighter, not a warrior, not a killer. And the partial soul that made him who he was, it was also not a killer. The heart was too soft for that.

"Don't let that asshole get into your head," Jack said suddenly from where he sat. "I spent half my life believing I was a murderer because of him. And now he's doing it to you. Brayden..." His eyes misted over and he lowered his head for a moment before looking back up. "Brayden believes in you. He thinks you're precious and worth protecting. So that means that you are. Fuck whatever Keith is trying to tell you. He doesn't give a fuck about anybody but himself, anyway. That's why nobody loves him and nobody ever will. You get what you give and all he gives is pain."

[Mikko Ashby]

"Whatever he made you do, Rip, that's not you." Mik's hand at his chest formed a loose fist. He actually started when Jack spoke up but instead of an angry tirade, Jack was just fiercely asserting the facts. And the fact was that whatever that Keith guy did to Rip or wanted him to do, he got it wrong. All wrong. He didn't know anything about Rip. Or Jack.

He brought out his phone and pulled up the gallery and showed them to Rip. "See this? And this? And these? This is who you are, Rip. Whatever Keith told you you were, he was wrong."

They were all pictures of Rip with the kittens, smiling. Or with the fish, his face partly distorted by the glass of the tank (Mik took the photo from the other side of the tank). Or Rip helping him with dinner, peeling corn husks for the first time. Rip smiling. He was smiling or he looked content in each of them.

"This is you."