IT'S YOUR DESTINY!!!

[nopunchline]

Who: Anyone, everyone? Aoba and Declan to start.
What: Destiny
When: After the House of Wolves, before The Taken King.
Where: Earth, The Last City, The Tower and beyond.
Warnings: Could be sorta zombie stuff (Hive), could be xenophilia? I dunno. Gen warnings, yo.

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Earth. 700 years into the future, humanity is all but gone, huddled in a massive city in the mountains, surrounded by gargantuan walls and living in the shadow of the slumbering, perhaps dead, body of The Traveler. The massive being of benevolence and light that came to Earth bearing gifts of knowledge that would bring about the longest Golden Age in Terran history, hovering in geostationary orbit over The Last City of men, protecting what is left from The Darkness beyond with the remains of it's Light.

For those on Earth it is a well-known story. With The Traveler's dying breath it created Ghosts, fragments of living Light that in turn resurrected men and women across the galaxy, bringing to bear the Guardians, warriors to fight the Darkness. Earth and all the nearby planets are populated by humans, the Awoken, Exos and a variety of species of ever more distant origins, some less generous than others. The Guardians make their headquarters in a colossal spire at the edge of The Last City. There, in the Tower, the Vanguard and other factions of humanity work together to hold the line and fight the Darkness and every other threat to the known universe. The little understood Guardians rarely venture beyond the Tower, preferring the company of their brothers and sisters in arms, but all look to the Tower as a beacon of hope.

There is danger and adventure to be had; the likelihood of death and the possibility of rebirth. The future is uncertain, but all who walk in the Light know the Darkness is coming, and the wise life to the fullest.

[ Destiny Wiki ]

Comments

[nopunchline]

Sit down where, he wondered, looking around fretfully. He tried really, really hard not to think about how Ren and Ghost were right there. Ghost was out of sight, and Declan didn't look for Ren, genuinely hoping both were somewhere else in the ship as he turned to tug Aoba towards the shower again with a shake of his head. At least they could close the door to the quarters.

Once in there, Declan turned and sat on the step outside of the shower, ears almost purple for how much blood rushed to his face. He felt more than a little dizzy between that and his tenting arousal. All things were disregarded, however, in favor of reaching out to tentatively touch Aoba's cheek, pale eyes wondering. He didn't care about being "riled up and ready to go", but he had so dearly wished he could be allowed to kiss him. Just a simple thing, a peck would be enough for him, if he were allowed.

[scrappyblue]

The answer Declan was looking for would have been ‘the bench in the shower’, naturally, but instead of letting Desire continue to lead him along to what he’d intended, the Guardian had the jitters getting the better of him. Desire actually did laugh, a short kind of thing, at the way Declan beat a hasty retreat further in. Wanted a kiss that badly, huh? And then Desire almost walked into him when Declan stopped before he expected him to. His moment’s bemusement was soon erased when the man sat where he did, but it occurred to Desire that Declan was practically blocking the way into the shower proper by sitting there. “Making me pay a toll first, huh?” he had to tease. For his own part, though, he was getting way too excited just to banter. Without leaving the Guardian room to properly answer, Desire stepped right over his lap and straddled him right there. Don’t think for a minute that he hadn’t missed that sweatpants tent, or that it was anything like accidental that he scooted his weight right up against it. Still, you had to admit, using Declan’s lap that way was pretty perfect for doing in that foot of height difference. With no tentativeness on his part, Desire looped his arms around his would-be partner’s neck before going in for the kiss, himself. A simple peck, it was not but he somehow refrained from going right for the all-the-way ravenous. His lips were parted just enough for a bit of extra heat and movement as he closed them against Declan’s, leaning all of the damp weight of his body against him.

[nopunchline]

He panicked for a moment, hands jolting up and wrapping around Aoba's waist reflexively. He thought they might both topple backwards for a second there, so unbalanced physically and mentally by the sudden kiss was he that he didn't have time to fret about the naked man in his lap, or how damp his clothes were getting. His hands were on bare hips, he realized with a mix of awe and terror. All of that evaporated with the kiss, though.

Pale eyes drifted closed in spite of a very real belief he needed to keep them open for...something. What, he didn't know, and as his hands slid up a little higher, lips parting to pucker for a more enthusiastic kiss, he wasn't sure it mattered.

[scrappyblue]

What mattered, maybe, was the encouraging groan brought up in Aoba’s throat by Declan’s effort. Maybe Desire was to blame for it, or maybe it was some extension of the way he had feeling in his hair when normal people wouldn’t have, but Aoba on the whole had always been so sensitive. Maybe you could even call it another reason for him to balk on other guys before getting further than kissing. His body wanted things so much more readily than the dominant side of his brain did. If Declan didn’t know—or consciously remember—how to kiss, Desire didn’t care enough to critique him. Learn by doing, eh? He tilted his head, slanting the angle of their lips together as he moved a hand up to rake his fingers through the Guardian’s hair. No mere finger-combing this time, he dragged his nails across pale scalp, delighted by Declan’s textures. About time.

[nopunchline]

He couldn't bear it so easily anymore, all the weight and pressure, the tastes and touches; it was wholly overwhelming. He groaned quite audibly when nails scraped across his skin, and muscular thighs trembled under Aoba as he strained to think away from his cock.

Kissing wasn't something he figured he'd be any good at, but trickled of muscle memory kept it from being sloppy. the rest was handled by dedication and enthusiasm. He wanted to breathe in the scent and lap up the tastes of the other man, to devour as much as possible before it was all ripped away. He wanted to be utterly consumed by the man's presence so in the dark hours when he was alone again, Declan could close his eyes and imagine holding something warm and perfect. He wouldn't let his inhibitions take that much away, and he made sure to move his hands, sliding up and down Aoba's back, shamefully greedy for every possible sensation.

[scrappyblue]

Aoba’s skin had grown a little chilled as he’d stood there in the open air with water evaporating from his body, but heat was quick to flush back through it as Declan’s hands gained the courage to roam. That state of half-hardness that had been bothering Desire so was quick to lose it’s ‘half’ness as well, as every overeager nerve between the kissing and the touching jolting into sparks that went right down his spine and to his groin. Declan could avoid the thoughts if he was that intent on it. Desire, on the other hand, thrilled in it. For him, there was no shame to be found in grinding his restored erection against the Guardian’s stomach, another sensation to take in as much as to make the other man aware of just what he so easily did to Aoba. “Don’t be shy, big guy,” he murmured in a space for breath, nipping at Declan’s lips. If consent and permission had to be so damn important—are you listening, Reason?—then he had to spare the moments to make sure he was encouraging as much as he could. “Put those hands everywhere you’re up for putting them.”

[nopunchline]

With Aoba being naked, there was no way for Declan to avoid the feeling of the man pressing against his belly, and it roused something utterly indescribable in him. He thought he might feel disgusted, or at the very least shocked by it all. Instead, all he felt was an overwhelming need. He desperately wished he weren't wearing any clothes himself, and wondered in a tiny moment of clarity if he weren't losing his mind. Shouldn't he be more cautious? Slower?

With Aoba rocking on his lap and bare, damp skin under his hands, he didn't have the will to fight it. The best he could hope for was following the still clutching moral dilemma keeping him from doing something regretful.

"My clothes," he managed to choke out, unable to articulate that he was wearing too much, that it was in the way, that he didn't want to wear them in the shower. He wanted - Traveler help him - to feel what their arousals sliding against one another was like. That was a fully equal footing activity, at least, and he hoped it would be more enjoyable than the few pathetic attempts at touching himself had been. Besides, with the shower just behind, they could clean up and try something else when they were of a mind. Messy, Aoba had said.

[scrappyblue]

Those two brief words saw Desire pulling his head back to grin, golden eyes both heated and alight with pleasure. It was the happiest the Guardian would have ever seen him look, really. Sometimes Desire was just a simple creature with simple needs, and they’d been unfulfilled for long enough that he was really quite malleable as a result. “Atta guy,” came another low purr, Desire once again needing to do very little to read what screamed along the uppermost surface of Declan’s thoughts. But it also made him wonder, what if he encouraged him just a little more? Not enough to break the compromise, else he might never get to soak in this kind of genuine attention and affection ever again, but enough to…ease the process. He kissed Declan again, a firm and lingering thing to tide him over for a while as he planted his feet and lifted his weight off of that maddeningly covered bulge. Aoba’s hands moved to the Guardian’s shoulders for maintained contact instead as Desire pitched his voice down, the way Aoba only half-knowingly did whenever he’d taken some of the sales calls working back in Heibon. He wasn’t going to force Declan into anything he didn’t actually want to do—but he sure was up for encouraging what he did want. “So hurry up and take them off~”

[nopunchline]

He didn't need the push, not really. He'd already intended to get his clothes off somehow, he just needed to tell Aoba so the man could either assist or move for a moment. With Declan already wanting his clothes off, the little barely there press of Scrap resulted in those always gentle, strong hands reaching up, gripping the sides of his t-shirt, and tearing the thing right in half with a loud rip.

"Wh--?" Declan made some small sound of distress, looking back and forth between both hands at the shredded fabric - he liked that shirt - before shaking it free and standing to sweep his pants off, kicking them away from his ankles. He wanted skin on skin more than he wanted the shirt, and didn't think about the consequences of his nudity for a second. Not until the pants were off, at least, and he coughed, covering himself with a little strained laugh of horror, cupping himself down as his eyes cast to the side.

He was not acting himself, he thought, closing his eyes tightly and breathing out slowly as he stood there, mildly paralyzed and feeling extraordinarily exposed for someone that had, until Aoba came into his life, been something of a naturalist.

[scrappyblue]

Did he really just- Watching Declan do nothing less than tear his shirt in half was simultaneously one of the most surprising and most arousing things Desire had ever witnessed. Goosebumps pricked up his skin at the sudden rush that he felt, and for that matter, his prick got all the more ‘up’ as well. It was frankly unfair how much he suddenly wanted those gentle-strong hands to be doing all number of things to him, given his understanding of how many of them Declan simply wouldn’t. It was almost thankfully that Desire was given reason to laugh just shortly after. This statuesque giant of a man, a supposed wrecker called Decker that Aoba had yet to see express anything more than frustration, a Titan with achievements and awards that went on for pages upon pages…was embarrassed by his boner? “I’ve got one too, you know,” Desire reminded him, standing with his legs slightly apart and a brief ‘tada’ gesture of his hands towards his own erection, flushed with arousal and all but straining the Guardian’s direction.

[nopunchline]

"Yes, I am very aware, thank you," Declan coughed softly, eyes skyward as he did an odd little tap-dance on the spot, feet flopping softly against the metal flooring as he tried to amp himself up again, get out of the headspace screaming for him to remember his manners.

"I'm sorry. I've never...I've been nude around others in the showers and things at the barracks, changing in the field. It's not the same when you're...you know..." He jerked his chin downward, indicating his arousal.

"Or intending to do something that requires nudity. I'm...not accustomed to this. Just because I know of things doesn't mean I've done them. In this life, anyways. I'm nervous," the Titan groused and fretted, Trying to push himself down but only succeeding in a more insistent erection.

"I've tried very hard not to think about things too much. I mean...some things I thought about anyways but I thought too much fantasizing was as bad as my advances and betraying my promise not to pressure you. Now I can't stop thinking about things. It's dizzying." Honesty overload.

[scrappyblue]

And he was talking to the wrong Aoba to really parse it, too. “Right, right, born-again virgin,” Desire acknowledged vaguely, idly moving a hand to touch himself now that no part of Declan was anymore. It was slow and deliberate, and certainly he meant it to be provocative. One hand boredly on his hip, the other wrapped around his dick, he dragged his fingers up and down the blood-flushed flesh rather than leave it so woefully neglected. Slowly, though. Drawing it out was kind of a pleasant torment. He didn’t want to get off alone, just being watched of all things, but he was too horny to just stand there. “Maybe you should just sit down on that bench in there and let me show you something they’re good for.”

[nopunchline]

A huffed sigh, one hand balling in a trembling fist, the other still covering himself, albeit only as a formality.

"I'm not a child...I know I'm not as quick as some people, or as educated, but I think for myself. I'm not afraid of doing things...I'm just afraid of failing at them. I don't want to humiliate myself with you when you're the only person I want to impress," the Titan explained, backing up towards the shower again, glancing at the interior then back to Aoba.

"I know things I want to do. I know I want to feel you against me. I know I want to put my hands on your body, and my mouth. I want a lot of things. I just don't know if they're right, or if I'll just seem stupid to you. You're...you're very intimidating like this, alright?"

[scrappyblue]

Well, Desire hadn’t been about to judge, but damn. He liked what he was hearing. Mostly the parts about what Declan wanted to do to him. The ideas already being there meant that Desire only had to get him to act on them, instead of give him some ideas to start from in the first place. “Big guy, you are talking to totally the wrong side of me if you want to know what’s ‘wrong’ or ‘stupid’. The other side’s the one that does that kind of over-thinking, which is why I’m up front right now. The thing that I do is go after what I want.” He flicked a hand in a dismissive gesture. The free one. The one he wasn’t touching himself with. Damn, they’d been having such a good make-out, why were they talking right now? The things an id had to do. “I don’t want you to impress me. I want you.”

[nopunchline]

"I want you, too," Declan replied, looking somewhat surprised at the admission before his expression hardened with a bit more conviction.

"I don't understand any of this. I don't...I don't know if you'll be angry with me tomorrow or not. But I want to spend as much time with you as I can before you're gone. And this...these are memories I want..." As much an admission to himself as Aoba, both hands fists then, forcing himself to move his hand away from his in all honesty painful erection. Lavender. His dick was lavender.

"Could...I touch you, instead?" he asked, face hot as he gestured vaguely between the two of them. I don't like touching myself." He'd learned that hard fact recently.

[scrappyblue]

“That’s what I’ve been trying to get you to do,” Desire could not but point out, despite his gaze having abandoned Declan’s face in favor of staring at what the Guardian had finally revealed. Honestly, the color only made sense after seeing his lavender-shaded blushes before. More importantly, goddamn. Jackpot. Now if he could just find the right combination to get less talking and more doing. Taking the initiative just scared the Guardian backwards a few steps, while waiting for him to show any had decidedly mixed results. As delicious as the torment of being so aroused without progression was, Desire was really a whole lot more interested in actually getting off. He was getting cold again, too, without the warmth of Guardian to counteract water-chilled skin. With something of a sigh, since Declan had balked twice so far at getting all the way to where Desire had been trying to herd him, the aspect half gave up and went for a new tactic: he sidled past the Titan, himself, hitting the controls to start filling the glassy enclosure with the encompassing heat of steam. He was actually starting to shiver, could you believe it?

[nopunchline]

"I didn't know you wanted me to touch you like that," Declan protested under his breath. Hard to say that he'd wanted to put hands on Aoba's cock, since it shocked himself. Worse, he wanted to put his mouth on the man's arousal and he had no idea what inspired that level of obscene.

When the water came on and Desire didn't immediately step into the steam and spray, Declan turned and reached out, cupping one of his massive hands on the back of the other man's neck before sliding slowly down his spine.

"Don't...don't turn around...not yet. Just give me a minute..." he pleaded gently, stepping in behind Aoba and leaning to press lips to the back of his neck, after delicately brushing his hair to the side. The Titan was still oblivious to any feeling in his friend's hair, so it wasn't taken advantage of (not that it would have been) when seeking to warm Aoba and taste skin without being faced with full frontal nudity just yet. He needed to work himself up, but at least it was more proactive than previous instances.

[scrappyblue]

Desire wanted to grumble that he’d told Declan as much already and was about to call into question how chaste these ‘compromises’ were going to end up being if something so simple had him shocked, despite his claims of already knowing where he wanted to put his hands and mouth. Two things stopped him. One of them was Reason. The other was a hand in his hair. With every strand a sensitive nerve, it was a suddenly overwhelming amount of sensation, even despite being gentler than Desire himself could have asked for. A low groan caught in his throat even before he was tilting his head forward, exposing even more of his nape to Declan’s lips. Goosebumps prickled his skin, but this time neither they nor his shivering was the fault of a neglected chill. It silenced Reason just as much, but the undercurrent from him was more subconscious, anyway. The reminder that Declan was intelligent and poetic, but rarely made assumptions. Things Desire thought were simple and obvious were not necessarily so. So somewhere at the tail end of that groan, he managed, “I want you do to everything to me. The only limits here are yours.”

[nopunchline]

"I won't do everything to you. I wish I could make you understand," Declan murmured, taking a step closer in so his chest just barely brushed Aoba's back. His skin prickled and there was a tightness between his shoulders, feeling his bare nipples brush flesh. It was utterly riveting, yet he still managed to continue kissing and nuzzling along the side of the other man's neck, hands drifting.

He kept a palm high, holding Aoba's hair out of the way and keeping him still with a light grip, while the other hand curled around, running up and down the flat expanse of belly. Eventually he steeled himself enough to close the distance between them, his arousal sandwiched against Aoba's buttocks, his roaming hand splayed against the space just above the other man's groin. He trembled, and there was no way Desire couldn't feel it.

"I don't have any limits, though. Anything you would have me do to you, you do to me. Show me the things you want and...if there comes a time when we have an accord and all of you is willing to accept my affections, I would be pleased to lavish you with every attention you desire. For now...I'll do my best to please you within my self-imposed restrictions."

[scrappyblue]

“Damn it, big guy,” Desire sighed, frustrated enough to breathe the words, but unable to hold anything close to a grudge when he was finally getting touched more. He leaned his weight back against the Guardian with a flush in his cheeks and his erection achingly swollen, squirming at the feel of things being so close but also so slow. This beating around the bush had gone on long enough. Declan didn’t make assumptions, needed things stated plainly for him? Fine. Reason needed to get over himself. “I’m trying to make you understand. I wouldn’t be here if part of me refused you.” He slipped his own hands back, each one finding the outside of a marble-white thigh to grip, securing himself in place all the more. It was less about emphasis, though, and more just about putting his hands somewhere they could hold on to.

[nopunchline]

The grip on his legs earned a low grunt, Declan's arousal twitching and hot against Desire's skin. He lowered his head a bit more, closing his eyes and resting his face against the crook of shoulder there.

"Refusal and acceptance don't stand in place of one another. It's more nuanced and you know it. You're only arguing because of what you want. I'm not willing to take too many more chances than I already am. I've risked too much. Even this feels selfish of me."

[scrappyblue]

Desire didn’t expect a nerve to be struck. One was. “Stop telling me who I am!” he snapped, voice too loud in the little space of the shower, nails biting into Declan’s legs when they hadn’t been a moment before.

[nopunchline]

He took the mild attack with his usual calm, stilling briefly. It took some thinking, wondering how his words had been construed as such, and he eventually reached down to pull hands from his thighs and turn the other man around.

"You misunderstand me," Declan sighed softly, ignoring their erections, hardly flagged and so close they could touch. This was more important. "Listen carefully."

"I would accuse anyone of the same, in a time like this. Even someone that doesn't want affection can want physical intimacy, and my interests in both are being forcibly split apart by the complications here. I don't understand what you've been through and what makes you this way, I don't think I could ever fully appreciate what's brought you to this point in your life without experiencing it myself, but the parts I am involved in are perfectly fine with me," the Titan insisted, reaching up and cupping a hand on Aoba's cheek gently.

"I can wait until you're comfortably whole inside and don't argue with yourself so much. What I need you to understand is that until then, I can't compromise my integrity and beliefs. If I do that, then what's the point of it being me versus any other person you know? If you get angry because you think I don't see you as a single person, then you need to see how much it hurts me for you to ignore my anxieties. I see you as one person, Aoba, but I see you as someone that second guesses everything and does things they regret. I don't want to be a regret, I don't want to be something you worry about. I want to be a stable pillar in your life, I want to be both the immovable object and unstoppable force in your life," he murmured, leaning in and pressing his lips gently - once, twice, three times - to Aoba's, gently caressing the hair near his temple.

"If I give myself to you, it is a compromise I can feel good about. I risk nothing by making myself available to your passions and desires. But if I took you, even if you say you want it now, you may look back and regret it. You might not regret me, but you too often look into yourself and over complicate your own feelings. I want being with me to be the easiest choice you've ever made. Right now it isn't, or we wouldn't have such a difficult time getting into the same room, let alone bed or shower. So please, stop being so angry. This isn't the time for that. I'm trying very hard not to be terrified of the things I want, and you being angry with me scares me more than any of it. We could be doing much more enjoyable things, if we could just stop thinking so hard."

[scrappyblue]

For Desire, it was the simple trigger of being ‘told’ (as he took it) what he knew or didn’t know, being ‘told’ why he was doing what he was doing. As the aspect who had been locked away for so long because of others’ judgements, as the aspect who had begun as the very essence of knowing what Aoba wanted, he took it unexpectedly hard to be ‘judged’ in such a way when he was going through all this effort to spell out the obvious. In some ways, he was very much still an erratic teenager. But Declan wasn’t the only one upset. Behind his thoughts, his other self was distressed. He’d wanted to take shelter behind Desire’s confidence and certainty, not his anger. Suddenly they were at odds again—not completely, but in parts—and Aoba’s body was tense under Declan’s hands. At the same time, however, it meant that he was not wholly disinclined to listen, however frustrated Desire wanted to be that now Declan wanted to talk, now he wanted to sound sure and confident of his choices. “I don’t have anxieties! That’s why I’m here!” Desire exclaimed, hands up in the air, making the frustrated gestures of one looking for the right words to pull out of it. It wasn’t a whole truth, else he wouldn’t have been so sensitive to being judged or ignored, but as far as words went, he was not nearly as eloquent as Declan could be. One of those hand-waves was even towards the back of his head, undermining his depictions of a unified individual when he said, “Thinking so hard is exactly the problem, but if putting me forward only means you overthink things instead, then the two of you are just going to overthink us all to-” Hazel. Like the flip of a switch, Desire’s ranting was cut off by Reason’s silence, tense posture going weak and hands returning to hang at his sides, eyes averted the moment after the change in aspects took place. A moment stretched out, long enough to note but not actually as long as it probably felt, before he managed, “…I made you think I don’t like you. I didn’t correct you when I should have. I thought…getting away from this overthinking side of me would fix it.”

[nopunchline]

Just as Declan was shuttering, thinking perhaps he was stupid for his anxieties, that his feelings shouldn't matter so much and he should be thinking only of Aoba (no matter how unhealthy those thoughts were or how much he'd already put Aoba/Desire before himself) the anger seemed to soften, and he looked up to hazel eyes. Pale brows pinched together in worry, then lifted slowly in cautious attentiveness.

"I never thought you didn't like me...only that you could never want me," Declan finally said, teeth finding his bottom lip for a moment, trying to ignore the prickling in his scalp as his body stayed very aware of it's naked proximity.

"They are very different matters, ignoring semantics. However, my like for you...exceeds simple friendship. It is...deeper." His fingers tapped lightly on Aoba's shoulders where he gripped them gently, nervous gestures as he tried to keep himself talking even if he worried he was digging a hole he should be avoiding.

"I'm in love with you, Aoba. The lengths to which I am willing to go for you are much greater than those I would go for someone like Mac or Cayde. I'm here, literally baring myself, because I want to give you everything. Even if I don't get everything in return, I would rather you come to me for things like this than someone else, so even if it were just part of you looking for an outlet, I could be happy knowing it was me and that I didn't have to imagine you with someone else. Even if it all terrifies me to some degree. Though...my compromises made you angry, and I'm sorry for it. In the end, there are some things I simply can't do. No matter how much I love you."

A rush of words, a tumble of feelings. He let himself speak and ignoring the ringing in his ears as he said more and more and too much, chest in agony as his heart beat in something so very like real terror. Admissions and reality, things he needed to say because all he did was make things worse. He was too stupid to be gentler, he thought. He wasn't smart like Mac, full of metaphors and "candy coating". He just knew what he felt and mostly why and acted accordingly within the range of his morals and politeness. Everything had become so complicated, though. He'd tried to be more careful and evidently only made things so much worse. He didn't blame Aoba's problems, the man hadn't asked for this, he wasn't responsible for Declan.

But how did you apologize to someone for loving them? Was that...how it was supposed to be?