please don't put your face into your hands (we could be friends) dirk<>roxy
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If there’s one thing Roxy knows for sure, it’s that she’s no longer on Earth.
For starters, the medium is a geographical nightmare; mountains jut out in nightmarish angles and neon-colored rivers meander around haphazardly. It’s beautiful and it’s magical but everything is different, too different, and sometimes it’s just unnerving. In another time, Roxy would have jumped at the chance for an epic adventure with her friends, exploring new lands and fighting evil like the heroine of an RPG. But when she looks up at the night sky and doesn’t recognize any of the stars, she misses home.
Even though Earth is long gone, the links tethering them to the past is not broken. It lives on in Jake’s shaky laughter and Jane’s trembling hands and Roxy knows that behind their bravado, they worry for their family and home. She knows the feeling well and wonders whether her Carapacian neighbors have somehow made it out alive. To Roxy, the colony is the only place she’s ever known - a world of seawater and checkered streets, burnished steel against pale blue skies. It was lonely at times, but it was still her home. On nights when she’s especially exhausted from running, hiding, and fighting for her life, Roxy closes her eyes tight and thinks of concrete and sea.
But from the four of them, Dirk worries her far more than the others. The past is alive, so very much alive in the calculating crease in his brows and the tightness of his smile. He lingers on the brink of breaking, neither here nor there, and Roxy knows it’s a matter of time before he shatters. Dirk has always been a man of many faces, but Roxy has learned how to tell them apart, the subtle differences between the Prince of Heart and the Dersite spy, the changes between the clever genius and love-struck teen. It’s a bit disconcerting for sure, but years of lonely webcam conversations and drunken pesterchats have long dulled the surprise. But since entering the medium, the differences are vanishing under one uniform Dirk that is precise and driven, sharply focused and coldly stubborn. That Dirk is an amazing leader, but Roxy misses her friend, the one who stayed up past three to watch terrible romcoms with her, the one who hacked into her MMORPG account and looted all her money in an act of petty revenge, the one who she has watched grow up from freckled awkwardness to a golden confidence that still takes her breath away. Although she hopes he will always be as brilliant as she knows he can be, he is only sixteen and under the weight of the world - she knows that it cannot be so. She just wishes she could hold his hand, squeeze it tight and tell him everything will be ok, jsut wait and see.
One night, after a particularly harrowing battle with the imps, Roxy slips to his side. She nudges him in the ribs until, with a long-suffering sigh, Dirk shifts so she can slide under his arm. But instead, Roxy clambers into his lap and sprawls across him, pointy knees and pointier elbows digging into his skin.
Roxy, what the hell- Dirk begins but Roxy jabs him sharply with her finger.
sshhhh! she shushes, reesitance is futile!!
Roxy is 100% sure that if she was anyone else - well, except maybe Jake but Dirk would probably let him get away with a lot of things, honestly - that Dirk would have shoved her off then and there. But like everybody else, Dirk has long learned that given half the chance, Roxy will drape herself over anybody and everybody like an overly affectionate cat and that it's better to comply, lest you wish to get a faceful of elbows. Although though he shifts stiffly, she fits comfortably against him, as if he was molded for her and she was made for him.
When his breathing steadies, she says u know, im here for u. if u need anyhting, just say the wrd.
Dirk cocks his head to the side. The lights of the stars gleam bright against his glasses.
Anything? he asks.
Twisting to face him, Roxy leans in close and lowers her head, gently pressing her forehead to his. She stares deep into his eyes, or at least where she hopes his eyes are because it’s really hard to tell with those stupid glasses in the way, but all she can really see is her own pale reflection, full of wistful hope and frustrated love.
anything she says and she means it, truly truly means it, and she wonders if he can hear the sincerity, the precarious balancing of her whole existence in that one word. And she thinks – no, she knows he can because there is a slight hitch in his breathing, so soft and subtle that someone else might have missed it but she’s Roxy Lalonde and she’s pressed up against his side so closely that she can feel the thrum of his veins against hers. Her own heart flutters frantically against his, thumping out a steady one, two, three.
On the fifth heartbeat, Dirk slips his hand into hers. His grip is tight. Through the inky darkness of his shades, his eyes seemed to smile, yet didn’t.
FILL: TEAM AUTORESPONDER<3ROXY
dirk<>roxy
----
If there’s one thing Roxy knows for sure, it’s that she’s no longer on Earth.
For starters, the medium is a geographical nightmare; mountains jut out in nightmarish angles and neon-colored rivers meander around haphazardly. It’s beautiful and it’s magical but everything is different, too different, and sometimes it’s just unnerving. In another time, Roxy would have jumped at the chance for an epic adventure with her friends, exploring new lands and fighting evil like the heroine of an RPG. But when she looks up at the night sky and doesn’t recognize any of the stars, she misses home.
Even though Earth is long gone, the links tethering them to the past is not broken. It lives on in Jake’s shaky laughter and Jane’s trembling hands and Roxy knows that behind their bravado, they worry for their family and home. She knows the feeling well and wonders whether her Carapacian neighbors have somehow made it out alive. To Roxy, the colony is the only place she’s ever known - a world of seawater and checkered streets, burnished steel against pale blue skies. It was lonely at times, but it was still her home. On nights when she’s especially exhausted from running, hiding, and fighting for her life, Roxy closes her eyes tight and thinks of concrete and sea.
But from the four of them, Dirk worries her far more than the others. The past is alive, so very much alive in the calculating crease in his brows and the tightness of his smile. He lingers on the brink of breaking, neither here nor there, and Roxy knows it’s a matter of time before he shatters. Dirk has always been a man of many faces, but Roxy has learned how to tell them apart, the subtle differences between the Prince of Heart and the Dersite spy, the changes between the clever genius and love-struck teen. It’s a bit disconcerting for sure, but years of lonely webcam conversations and drunken pesterchats have long dulled the surprise. But since entering the medium, the differences are vanishing under one uniform Dirk that is precise and driven, sharply focused and coldly stubborn. That Dirk is an amazing leader, but Roxy misses her friend, the one who stayed up past three to watch terrible romcoms with her, the one who hacked into her MMORPG account and looted all her money in an act of petty revenge, the one who she has watched grow up from freckled awkwardness to a golden confidence that still takes her breath away. Although she hopes he will always be as brilliant as she knows he can be, he is only sixteen and under the weight of the world - she knows that it cannot be so. She just wishes she could hold his hand, squeeze it tight and tell him everything will be ok, jsut wait and see.
One night, after a particularly harrowing battle with the imps, Roxy slips to his side. She nudges him in the ribs until, with a long-suffering sigh, Dirk shifts so she can slide under his arm. But instead, Roxy clambers into his lap and sprawls across him, pointy knees and pointier elbows digging into his skin.
Roxy, what the hell- Dirk begins but Roxy jabs him sharply with her finger.
sshhhh! she shushes, reesitance is futile!!
Roxy is 100% sure that if she was anyone else - well, except maybe Jake but Dirk would probably let him get away with a lot of things, honestly - that Dirk would have shoved her off then and there. But like everybody else, Dirk has long learned that given half the chance, Roxy will drape herself over anybody and everybody like an overly affectionate cat and that it's better to comply, lest you wish to get a faceful of elbows. Although though he shifts stiffly, she fits comfortably against him, as if he was molded for her and she was made for him.
When his breathing steadies, she says u know, im here for u. if u need anyhting, just say the wrd.
Dirk cocks his head to the side. The lights of the stars gleam bright against his glasses.
Anything? he asks.
Twisting to face him, Roxy leans in close and lowers her head, gently pressing her forehead to his. She stares deep into his eyes, or at least where she hopes his eyes are because it’s really hard to tell with those stupid glasses in the way, but all she can really see is her own pale reflection, full of wistful hope and frustrated love.
anything she says and she means it, truly truly means it, and she wonders if he can hear the sincerity, the precarious balancing of her whole existence in that one word. And she thinks – no, she knows he can because there is a slight hitch in his breathing, so soft and subtle that someone else might have missed it but she’s Roxy Lalonde and she’s pressed up against his side so closely that she can feel the thrum of his veins against hers. Her own heart flutters frantically against his, thumping out a steady one, two, three.
On the fifth heartbeat, Dirk slips his hand into hers. His grip is tight. Through the inky darkness of his shades, his eyes seemed to smile, yet didn’t.
Roxy laughs.