#just kaps

Sano is the satisfaction of cotton candy melting on your tongue. He's the thrill of whispering dare when someone asks, “truth or dare?” He's the soft sand pressed between your toes as crystal blue water laps gently against your shins. He's the spark of two eyes meeting briefly across the room, the suppressed smirk of knowing a well kept secret. He's the stifled laughter in a quiet crowd. He's the giddiness of being caught in a sudden downpour, of looking up into the rain and spreading your arms in acceptance. He's the twinge in your heart when you see two friends laughing without you, the doubt that surfaces when you wonder if you're the punchline. He's the jolt in your jaw when something too sweet rolls against your taste buds.

“Look at this."

Striker lazily looked over at the sound of Caine's voice, eyes only half open. It was a brilliantly sunny day, but the air was chilly-- His favorite kind of day. The type of day that you could only ever find on Earth.

"What?" He asked through a stifled yawn, stretching his wings out on either side of him grandly. Until Caine spoke he was very nearly sleeping.

"Look at this," Caine repeated, lifting the object in his hand so Striker could get a better look from where he lay. They were at the edge of a vast valley, caught between field and forest. Trees were scattered haphazardly around them, their leaves caught in a beautiful transition between summer and fall. Striker had never been there before, but he already loved it so much it hurt.

Striker propped himself up on an elbow to lean closer to Caine's item. "What is it? " he asked, reaching out to pluck it from his friend's fingers. He drew it close to his face and studied it, twisting it this way and that. He looked up when he heard Caine give a small puff of a laugh.

"Right, I guess the trees in Aether don't need these," Caine said, taking the spiny brown object back from Striker. He threw it into the air and caught it with a grin. "This is a pine cone, dear Striker. Trees use these to make more trees."

Striker sat upright and stared quizzically at the pine cone. "Why?" He chirped, feeling excitement well up in his chest. He didn't know what he loved more than learning more about Earth and its mysterious workings. There was notably no magic, but everything just... went on. A giant masterpiece, a machine with a million million different cogs that all played their own part.

"Well," Caine started, looking like he was trying hard not to smile, "Trees here on earth have a life span. Sometimes they grow too old and wither, sometimes they are cut down for resources. Sometimes they burn in lightning storms and sometimes the wind can knock them down." He fluttered his wings and gave Striker a meaningful look as the younger boy opened his mouth to ask another question. Striker instead ducked his chin and pressed his lips together apologetically.

"This," Caine continued, pressing the pine cone into Striker's palm, "Is the seed of one of these trees. What happens is they essentially go to sleep for the winter and drop these so more trees can be born. This way there is balance; trees die and trees are born. Not too many, not too little."

Striker gazed down at the impossible seed in his hand and he loved it. Another cog in the machine. Why did Aether strive to be perfect in magic when it could be flawed in beautiful mystery? He raised his eyes to peer at the impossibly blue sky peeking through the tree's canopy and felt a long sigh escape his lungs.

"Don't like pine cones?" Caine asked, brows raised. "I thought you'd like them."

"I love them," Striker whispered. "I love everything about this place. It..." He broke off, dropping his eyes to the leaf littered ground. "It feels like I don't ever want to leave."

Caine was silent for so long that the younger angel glanced over. "You don't have to," the older boy murmured.

Striker looked away, frowning. He knew what the other boy meant... Just a couple weeks back Caine had confided that he was very seriously thinking of leaving Aether for good. To become a fallen. Striker had remained uncomfortably silent then, not knowing what to say. He could hear the ‘you could come with me’ ringing in his ears, even though Caine hadn't said it out loud.

Striker had a thousand reasons to say yes, but he was finally going to start his job as a guardian next week and he just knew that this was his big chance to finally prove himself. Change was coming, he could just feel it.

So he remained silent again, keeping his eyes low. He halfheartedly flapped one of his small wings to rid it of a buzzing fly. He wished Caine would stop staring...

He heard the older boy shift and peeked through his lashes to see him collecting some different colored leaves.

"You are like this place," Caine mused, not looking at Striker. "You feel the same as this place feels. It's almost like... You belong here."

"In this forest?" Striker asked incredulously, looking around. He felt his heart swoop at the idea of belonging-- it reminded him of stories his mother told him as a child of fate and destiny.

"Everywhere on Earth," Caine corrected, plucking a blade of grass from the ground beside him. He squinted one eye shut and held the blade of grass up towards Striker, as if he were trying to make a line over one of the boy's eyes with it. The grass shone in a ray of sunlight breaking through the canopy of trees, brightening from a deep emerald to a bright yellow-green. "The grass is your eyes." He carefully laid it on the ground beside him and plucked a leaf from his meticulously stacked collection. This leaf had fallen in the middle of its transition from summer to fall, mixed between two colors like a natural painter's palette. A reddish orange and golden yellow warred over the leaf's veined surface, creating a burnt golden hue. "The autumn leaves are your hair," Caine said matter-of-factly as he laid the leaf by the others he had collected. He raised his face to the sky and squinted in the bright sunlight, his hand raising up to gesture vaguely upwards. "The sky is your soul. It feels like I had come here to already find you lying in the grass, like I am a trespasser where you belong."

Striker looked away before Caine could meet his eyes again. He didn't know why, but he didn't have the heart to tell him he felt the same-- That he had been here all along. It felt surreal that he had to go back... But that's where he grew up and it's all he ever knew.

Until now.

He looked over at his friend who was studying him in a good natured sort of way. He wanted to say something profound about his friend too, but he had never been as articulate as him. He wanted to tell him how lucky he felt to have him as a companion... That if Caine hadn't made he effort to befriend him then he would be alone entirely. He wanted to tell him that he essentially saved him from a life of misery, but-- he was pretty sure Caine already knew that.

Striker cast about his surroundings, looking to fill the silence with his own comparisons of his friend's features but stopped short. He only knew of one thing that reminded him of Caine's hair... But how do you tell someone all you can think of is 'fire' when you see them? The color was a vibrant red that was rare among angels, as it was considered an omen of evil. Striker didn't care about this, for even though his hair was nowhere near as red as Caine's, it was tinged with it; as if the blonde locks he should have been born with had been stained. He knew very well that not an evil thought lingered in neither his nor his friend's hearts.

He pulled a knee to his chest and rested his cheek on it as he studied the rest of Caine, trying to think of something more beautiful to say than 'well, you look like fire'. But the more he looked, the less he could think of anything else. Caine was fire. The yellow simmer in his eyes that always seemed to churn with secrets looked like molten gold. His posture was always relaxed and easygoing, but something in the way his mouth quirked and eyes narrowed held a thousand dangerous curiosities and unasked questions. Striker had always liked this quality about his companion-- it matched something in his own heart. A want for something more, a hole in their hearts that Aether could never fill.

But now, when all he could see was fire, he thought he could see it. Maybe... maybe not see it. He felt it. The tilt of Caine's head when he looked at the leaves and trees around him wasn't an innocent curiosity of ‘how does this work?’ It was more like ‘how fast can I make this burn?’ Striker felt a thrill shoot up his spine as he remembered what Caine had said only a moment before. You are like this place.

He thought that now, as the older boy gazed intently back, he could feel that same danger. That the way Caine tilted his head at him now wasn't ‘what are you thinking?’ It was ‘how fast can I make YOU burn?’