100mitsubishis | mental link

[ It's some time late at night, or maybe early in the morning, when Sam finally slips into a deep enough sleep for dreams to come. And given the fluid nature of the Nest and their mental link, at least it's not a nightmare - shit knows that Sam's had more than one of those bleed over onto him.

Hope you weren't set on sleeping alone, Kavinsky, because Sam's wandering mind has definitely latched on to their connection. He latches onto the familiar attachment, their mental connection widening as Sam's mind settles more into Kavinsky's. The dream is tenuous at best, flashes of colors and sensations, the press of fingertips here and the sound of laughter there, but it focuses, a little, as even in sleep, Sam recognizes the feel of Kavinsky's mind.

There's a soft hum of acknowledgement, the stretch of wings curled around Kavinsky as Sam pulls him in.

Hey, tiger. ]

[Kavinsky has always dreamed alone.

Sometimes human-shaped things cropped up, but they weren't people, even when he brought them home with him and kept them without permission. They were figments of his imagination given enough flesh and blood and voice that they would pass any Turing test with flying colors. But they weren't people, because Kavinsky slept alone.

Only one other person should've been able to enter his dreams, and for all he knows, that boy is dead. He's long gone, at least, not part of the Nest, not near enough to Kavinsky to start the nasty business of subconscious infiltration.

But it is the Nest fucking with him. It is that Hivemind turning can't into shouldn't but gonna do it anyway. Someone's inside his hideyhole. Inside those labyrinthine corridors of chrome that make up his dreamscape most nights since he was spacenapped.

And that someone has wings. And that someone is pulling him close. Not formless, but not as whole as Kavinsky, who has practice at this. Who keeps all his limbs where they ought to be and his mind centered.

He's lucid. Sam--because of course it's Sam--is not.]

Shit, can't even leave me alone when we're sleeping? You've got a real complex, sweetheart, seriously, do we have a doctor on board to look at that?

[ No, Sam isn't lucid. Nightmares are one thing - he's trained himself to yank himself out of nightmares, to change their ending, but even then he's not successful every time. A dream like this? Something formed from the connections in his mind, things he's seen before and someone he knows from the Nest?

It doesn't register at all.

Kavinsky bitches at him - of course he does - and Sam laughs, wings closed tight around them both - pressed up against Kavinsky's back as good as arms locked around his shoulder and waist.

It's true. Sam can't seem to leave him alone, but then, wasn't Kavinsky the one who challenged him to find a way into his mind in the first place? Maybe Kavinsky can't seem to leave Sam alone, either, and in the surreal landscape of the dream, the pieces of Kavinsky that are buried in his mind are pulled to the forefront. ]

Sweetheart, huh? You finally coming to terms with a couple of things?

[At this point Kavinsky's visited several waking worlds, so he can say--definitively--dreams always win out. The only downside he's discovered is his connection with the rest of the Nest can sometimes unsettle his control. Never completely, but there are moments he falls into a nightmare he didn't conjure up. Seconds in which he's not entirely sure of who he is, before his lucidity slips back over his arms and shoulders like a familiar coat. Wraps around his legs, hangs low like he always prefers his pants to.

This is not one of those times. This is Sam's dream colliding with Kavinsky's and making a home for itself. He's held to the man's chest like some precious little thing, and it makes him both want to gag and laugh his ass off.

He knew it.]

Only that you and I need some space.

[Kavinsky lulls his head back, but otherwise doesn't struggle. If anything, he's settling a hand on Sam's chest with no real purpose. Fingers tap in a staccato.]

But we aren't getting that anytime soon, man, so I'm just buckling in.

[ Dreaming is a tenuous, nebulous thing for Sam, filled with things that don’t make sense and things that are all too real - things he never wanted to see again and things he wishes wouldn’t disappear when he wakes up - and this is no different. His own form is surprisingly steady, the only real difference being the huge, feathered wings that sprawl from his back, which is… not unusual, for a dream, but more telling of the symbiote connection and his subconscious mental representation of himself.

He doesn’t notice. Of course he doesn’t; he’s dreaming, so why the hell shouldn’t he have wings or Kavinsky snarking at him?

Sam can admit to himself that he kind of enjoys Kavinsky always trying to ruffle his feathers, and he smiles a little at the hand on his chest. He hasn’t exactly tried to keep it hidden that he thinks Kavinsky could use some genuine affection, physical or otherwise. ]

Going along for the ride, huh? Not like you not to try to grab the wheel, or at least pump on the gas a little.

[Kavinsky never plays with his form. With the amount of control he has over the dreamscape, it would surely be nothing to give himself claws or fangs or scales, but he'd most likely wake up with them and no guarantee he could then dream them away the next night. Better not to test it when there are so many things he does know--for sure--that he can take advantage of.]

Ooooh.

[God, can he take a picture? Will a camera into his hand and snap a couple shots of Sam to show him the following morning? Look at yourself.

But then there would, of course, be polaroids of him letting Wingman hug him.

So no.]

You want me to get the ball rollin' when its in your court? Shit, man. This is your dream.

[ Come back to me in five years, Sam’d teased, however many months ago, when Kavinsky was getting a little too graphic with his bantering. Trying to find a nerve, Sam’d thought, and he still thinks that - though now he knows that he’s fronting, too, that he doesn’t want to admit that he’s into men.

For a good reason, and Sam’s back off a little on teasing him about that - but a only a little. He’s not interested in handling people with kid gloves, with tip-toeing around someone’s issues.

That’s always just made them feel like more of a freak, in his experience.

So he laughs at Kavinsky’s comment, the dream world around them shifting with Sam’s amusement - a wordless uh-huh, all me - form shifting, becoming less solid.

Less a physical place and more sensation, the smoothing of fingertips over skin, warm breeze tugging through hair. Teasing, taunting. ]

[Sam's dreams aren't solid things, are they? They're wispy, fluttering in the breeze like dandelion seeds. They float like feathers, stroking over one's cheek before sailing out of reach. And it's the opposite of what Kavinsky's always sought out in his dreamscapes. He wants concrete items; he wants metal, wood, earth. He can't mold a feeling.

So he reaches out for the reins of the dream and tugs them harshly, drawing Sam taut, forcing him back into a body of Kavinsky's crafting (a perfect Sam replica down to his nails, his hairline, the circumference of his waist, the angle of his calf leading to ankle).

God, he better not wake up with a second Sam in his room because this goes awry. Where would he put the body?]

Not into the ghost thing, man. Nice try.

[ No, they rarely are. His dreams are sensations and emotions, sounds and touches and smells and tastes, feelings and impressions - when they go solid it's usually a flashback, or else those are the ones he doesn't remember.

But it's a dream, so Sam accepts it easy as anything - reacts as though Kavinsky was pulling him in, fingers tangling in clothes and tugging them harshly to haul him closer.

There's a huff of surprise as he stumbles in close enough to press against Kavinsky, to feel the warmth of skin against skin even though a layer of fabric, but he doesn't step away. He leans in, voice a low murmur without saying anything outloud, blunt fingernails dragging over shoulder blades. ]

You figured out what you are into, then?

[He's never seen a romantic comedy in his life. He falls asleep or wanders out of the room before most other movies end, so he misses that moment--the kiss moment. The moment where the audience goes aww and holds the hand of their own loved one in solidarity.

But he's kissed before. Done a whole lot more than kissing before, though never with boys, even if he's sure he could have found one or forty willing to do it even without a bribe.

This feels like a double-whammy. A Moment with a capital M, mixed with generous heapings of man right in front of him.

So he pauses and he sinks into the dream floor until he catches himself and solidifies it once more. He waits too long, longer than he's ever waited before chasing after what he wants.

He's a fox after rabbits, always has been, but he never figured he'd meet the overgrown hare that would sit there and wait for him.

There's a bit of a height gap between them. He has to rock up onto his toes when he shoves his mouth against Sam's.

No one can ever know this wasn't a dream. That number now doubly includes Sam himself.]

[ Honestly, Sam has had weirder fucking dreams than this.

Literally, in some cases.

The connection between them hums with something that feels almost heavy, and if Sam were conscious maybe he could follow down it, could figure out what's going on in Kavinsky's thoughts behind what he's doing, and they could figure it out together -

But then Kavinsky pushes up onto his toes and kisses him, and Sam kisses back without a second thought. He pulls Kavinsky's lower lip between his, teeth sinking in sharp and bruising as he curls a hand around the back of Kavinsky's head.

His sleeping mind presses more into Kavinsky's, just as he'd done when they practiced shielding - only now he doesn't stop. Now he seeps in, wind tugging and pulling and traveling through the maze of Kavinsky's mind, skipping over the unshielded spaces that don't feel like what he's looking for and probing further.

He doesn't ask what do you want because the answer he's gonna get is Kavinsky being Kavinsky, deflecting and mouthing off and shooting off insults to cover up the line between what he thinks he should want and what he really does. Instead he searches Kavinsky's mind himself, seizing at every fantasy, every stray thought, stretching down to find the desires he keeps buried, the ones even Kavinsky might not know about.

What do you need. ]

[Kavinsky's need has never been placed on the backburner for any discernible reason. According to him, he's well aware of what he needs, it just happens that the Venn diagram between his needs and his wants is a single, cohesive circle. Most beasts are like that; they want to fuck, fight, and submit themselves to chaos, and they need the same wretched things. No one has any right to judge him, especially not in the Nest where they have some access to his mind, they can see how easy it is to slip. And he's happy, probably. He's content with himself, most likely.

He's doing what he needs/wants and there's no one there to stop him. Even Sam's started slipping, too, albeit while unconscious. He wouldn't bite Kavinsky's lower lip if he was awake. (Ronan wouldn't let Kavinsky touch his back if he was awake).

But it feels like being need/wanted to an uncomfortable degree when the wind of Sam sweeps in and clears away the cobwebs. Kavinsky won't tremble like some breezed past tree branch, but he brusquely tears himself away from the kiss he went and started. It would be easier to keep going if Sam wasn't already skipping past general horniness to the red-lit danger zone of intimacy.]

You're always like this, huh? You don't turn off?

[Sleeping Sam's still Sam. It's a travesty.

A greater travesty: the imagined pain of his lip after that bite will disappear once they both wake up.]

[ Kavinsky needs more than he knows, Sam's sure of that - he's not as sure that Sam's the one who can give it to him, but that doesn't matter right now.

What matters is that it's too late to dislodge Sam. Kavinsky's mind is a familiar feel, from the time they accidentally shared brain space, and Sam settles deeper into it. There's the feel of fingertips up his spine, warm and solid as if they were actually there, and Sam leans in to curl his hand around the back of Kavinsky's neck and hold on tight, kissing him again. ]

( I am who I am, tiger, you've seen most of it. ) [ More than a lot of the Nest, really - he's seen the memories of Sam killing men and saving them, felt downy feathers and sharp knives.

He is who he is, and the darkness that twines in his mind doesn't make him feel the sun any less brighter.

You let me in, his mind murmurs, an observation and a promise, and he threads his other hand in Kavinsky's hair hard enough to sting and wraps his wings around them both. ]

[Kavinsky opened the door wide, and his reasoning doesn't matter weeks later. He could try to explain why he did what he did and for what purpose--how he meant to build up his own mental resistances to a worthy height and then how he didn't think letting Sam challenge him once would mean he could forever, permanently as long as the symbiotes keep sucking at the teat of their gray matter. He didn't know.

Does Sam kiss like this in the land of the waking? Does he always use the foundation he built in the bowels of someone else's mind to stop them from leaving? Are his lips this breathtaking? Kavinsky's always preferred the world that appeared before him once he shut his eyes, so he can't imagine they're equals.

But maybe the hand pulling his hair would leave an even sharper sting behind, which makes him nearly, kind of want to know. A want tucked away to be observed from a distance at a later time.]

( Don't say I didn't warn you. )

[Although he didn't, but Kavinsky gives up the ghost for a glorious moment where his lips part, his tongue darts out, and he lets his grip on the dream world around them go slack. They could be anywhere, as long as Sam lets Kavinsky shove past his teeth.]

[ The thing is - the thing is, Sam didn't know either. He does now, maybe, or at least he suspects, that it's never just once and done, that this ability he hasn't quite fully developed has effects that linger. But he can't say he wouldn't have done it anyway. Can't say he wouldn't have let Kavinsky in, have tried to get Kavinsky to let him in - he's still gonna try, still gonna work to prove to him that he deserves better, deserves love, that he's worth more than he thinks.

Only now it's easy, when it's somewhere in their subconscious. This isn't the first time that Sam's let himself drift into the symbiote link, focuses so much on the mental that it might as well be the physical. And he kisses like he always kisses, like he'd kiss if this was the physical.

Maybe. Definitely. Sam is who he is, and Kavinsky may shape the dream world with an easy hand, but Sam weaves himself into Kavinsky's mind, sharp talons and soft feathers. His teeth graze over Kavinsky's tongue as he lets it lick into his mouth, scraping somewhere between playful and a tease at a bite that doesn't come, as he soothes it instead with a swipe of his own tongue.

It's a challenge, almost. He'll take everything Kavinsky's got, anything he thinks he can throw at him.

He doesn't need a warning. ]

[Someone who isn't Kavinsky, who wasn't bred with that kind of resilience in mind, should tell Sam he wants too much. That he gives off this aura of a giver, and he certainly gives it out like nobody's business, but he's no saint. Not unless saints are also incessant men nearing forty with hands so warm they leave burned reminded wherever they settle. And that's not even dream Sam, the one who's free to do whatever he wants because he has no idea there are consequences to these actions. Normal Sam can be six times as bad; under the guise of a lesson, he dug a ditch in Kavinksy's mind and left a personal GPS tracker.

No wonder he ended up in his dream. No wonder he ended up kissing him and dragging his teeth along Kavinsky's tongue. What did K think was gonna happen after Sam entangled them?

He has always been adept at dangerous. When did he become weak enough to think anything would be safe?

Kavinsky's nails catch along Sam's ribs, over the cotton-knit dream shirt he wears, so it's doubtful he'll leave a mark (not that he could, not that it's real). He tries to, anyway. He's got tenacity in spades as he digs into the fabric and draws them up and up.]

DREAM there isn't anything else	THIEF get in get out
DYING a boring side effect	PARTY god that would be awesome

mental link

some nebulous time when they're both asleep

cw: what is this mess, also dubious sexual situations with a barely not-minor

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