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Cruising aimlessly through space, Makkari forgot just how much she’d misused the Domo.
Makkari mourns a quiet funeral for sunlight. On Earth, she was still as a mouse when it was her choice to be still as one. When opening the ramp of the Domo was an option to simply lounge, curled up with a book in the scorching heat until she could no longer stand it, choosing to absorb every printed syllable on the aged paper and round sunglasses perched atop her braids like a crown. The homesickness for Earth surprises her, how it sneaks up when she least expects it. Many years gone, there’d been times the longing for Olympia was so severe it brought tears to her eyes. She didn’t even know what it was she missed so much, lost in the fog of locked memories, all Makkari knew was the way as much as she loved the world, she didn’t fit in it, and Olympia, the way Ajak described, was a paradise, a reward they deserved for sticking through the days and weeks and months and years and centuries of pushing through Deviant attacks, being loyal to Arishem.
Then, Druig was there for her. Crouched in front of her with worry etched onto his face as she lamented out her frustrations. The time will come, he’d reassure, signing with a conviction that Makkari wasn’t sure he genuinely possessed. Or, maybe he possessed it because she needed it in those moments, and that’s all that mattered at the time.
Druig was here for her now, too.
She pulled away from her blank gaze at the wall, book almost limp in her grip when she felt the rustle of his jacket brush against her shoulder. “I don’t miss the sun,” he said and signed, leaning beside Makkari.
The corner of her lips tugged into a small smile. How did you know that’s what I was thinking about?
Druig tapped at his brain with a wry smile that could mean a lot of things. Makkari bumped her shoulder against his. He bumped back. He liked to joke that he knew her thoughts as though they’d been gifted to him along with his powers over the human mind, but she knew he couldn’t–wouldn’t even if he wanted to.
I know you, he signed instead. The simplicity of it touched her. And my source of sunlight comes from you.
From me?
The brightness in your eyes.
Her lips parted as her hands fell uselessly to her lap, only able to suck in a half breath. Almost three weeks on the Domo, and Makkari has yet to learn how to become unparalyzed by Druig’s open affection.
“Hmm?” Druig brushed his thumb gently over her mouth. Bolder than usual, Makkari didn’t mind. She tilted her head up, eyes on his until they closed to kiss him. Druig pulled away. It took a moment for Makkari to discern the new vibrations in the room from the thudding in her chest.
Eros waltzed into the room, head turned so Makkari couldn’t get a gist of what he was saying that made Druig’s demeanour change from his shamelessness to clouded irritation so suddenly. She would like to think Eros was oblivious to what he just interrupted, but she had a sneaking suspicion he saw all without care, or worse, with too much care.
“Was I interrupting something?” Eros poked fun, falling dramatically upon the couch across from them in the communal room. “No? Feel free to carry on. Don’t stop on my account.”
“Don’t you ever get tired of your shit, Eros?” His hands jerked with the tension of his simmering disdain in his signs. Makkari worried her lip. She’d seen this expression on Druig before, the development of a rivalry like the one he shared with Ikaris would not do well confined on the Domo.
The way Eros frowned was unlike any Makkari had ever seen, somehow always accompanied by a dazzling smile. “I’m sorry?”
It almost made Makkari want to apologize to him instead of wish the other way around. And for what? What did Makkari do to need forgiveness from Eros?
“Don’t act like you don’t play this game every damn day.” Druig glowered at him, only softening his expression to sign to her, Don’t let him fool you. I need to ask Thena something, okay? I’ll be back.
Makkari nodded, turning to face Eros reluctantly once they were alone.
“I know a near kiss when I see one.” Eros folded a leg underneath the other, stretching out his arms behind him until Makkari assumed they cracked. “Tell me, what about our darling Druig ignites your fire?” He propped his chin against the arm couch with a Cheshire grin, eager for gossip.
Fire? Makkari signed with a slightly confused smile, furrowing her brows.
“In the heart,” Eros explained with his hands, What makes you love him?
Makkari appreciated that he did not deny that there was love. That it was there and it was real. She was secretly relieved, even. So, it was not just her, seeing illusions. It was not the remnants of Sprite’s flair sprinkled into the air that was the cause for Druig’s stone-cold face-melting by her gaze.
Eros must feel it somehow. Though Makkari usually wanted to discover everything, she was shy to question this one.
Makkari saw why he bestowed the name of the fox. He's clever, witty, and very hard not to look at, adorned in a suit of passion red with a silver breastplate swirling with what awfully resembles gold wedding rings. Slightly cunning, with his head cocked to the side with a pout and rounded eyes packed with charm, there was no doubt in Makkari’s mind how innocent beings could get trapped in his well-intentioned ploys.
Star-crossed lovers? Yeah. Eros crossed them.
Don’t let him fool you , Druig just warned her. By what means could Makkari ever be fooled by how she felt about Druig? Eros swore up and down that he was nothing like his brother, Thanos. Makkari believed him. She does her best not to judge Eros for simply being a Titan on the same principle she wouldn’t want anyone harbouring disdain for them on the mere grounds of being Eternals.
So she took his bait to talk about what Druig meant to her. She found she wanted to. Taking her time, she settled back to think about her answer with a natural smile.
Many things. He is independent, confident, cynical but compassionate, she began to sign, going slowly as Eros was still learning, though very quick to follow, every new sign immediately branded into his memory’s vocabulary repertoire. It was an early and well-known fact most Eternals were equipped to adapt to any language. Eros boasted knowledge of over 500 extraterrestrial ones.
Eros quirked a doubtful eyebrow at her choice of descriptor, but it was true. Makkari let her mind linger on a memory that clung to her, a moment of shared vulnerability, how she’d seen Druig in anguish and misery and how it melded so strongly with his strikingly complex compassion as if it were the matter that made up his system.
The first time we saw humans on Earth commit atrocities against each other, he cried and cried.
He is also playful, Makkari was quick to change the subject to match her lifting mood, choosing to share what made him a great partner. We have fun together. He doesn’t mind mischief. We have secrets and inside jokes that span on for centuries. And when we were entangled in the lies of it all, even as his faith in Arishem waned, he comforted me. Nobody understood him. And for so long while we were on Earth, nobody understood me.
“That’s fascinating. Please, continue,” Eros urged, absolutely enraptured by her flowing story. Makkari didn’t need to be prompted, her back straight against the chair, and energy thrumming in her fingertips, as though the next words would tumble out of her hands and cram into the ones she’s already signing because to tell Eros about this was liberating and there was so much to say about why, why, why Makkari was in love.
His mind is like a book with riddles. He is not boring, he is not predictable, yet he is fashioned by the same age-old struggle to be detached from humanity when he knows he can’t be. He seldom obeys himself. I love him when he is flirty. I love him when he is angry. I love him when he is a brat. I love him when he is right and I love him when he is wrong. For him, I would kill. For him, I would die. He is my Druig. He is beautiful to me.
She closed her eyes, squeezing them shut for a second, recollecting the pieces of herself scattered all across this patterned Domo floor. Her breathing was heavy, fast, her head swimming. What did Eros do to her? She didn’t mean–She hadn’t even known that was all it was in every detail until it flowed out of her. The sincerity and the urgency, the way every sentence in all its honesty was not even enough.
“Makkari.”
She felt someone speaking from the shift in vibrations before she forced herself to open her eyes.
I need a minute.
Or two or five. There was no way she could meet Eros in the eye, not when she was this overwhelmed, she almost wanted to be angry, to feel so peeled open, so raw. Makkari wasn’t fooled, that hadn’t been what happened. She wasn’t deceived, there was nothing that wasn’t true, that hadn’t been felt, that hadn’t been needed to be said, nothing that Makkari was ashamed of. She was just so unprepared to face the intensity of it of all. To yield such passion with such ferociousness, it ravaged her body until she was sick with it like a dying star needing to combust.
A hand was on her shoulder, and it wasn’t the light breezy weight of Eros.
She snapped her head up with a startled gasp.
“Makkari.”
It was Druig. His eyes were light in the dark. She’d seen them glow in gold more times than she could remember, but this was different than all of that. The light wasn’t cast over like a layer of thick honeyed glaze from the cakes he adored so much as he unified with people. No, Makkari was seeing through Druig, she was looking at him. The only soul he stirred was hers. She understood now the tale he spun about sunlight, how it was felt by her spirit radiating warmth through her eyes.
Are you okay?
Makkari shook her head. The sonic sob that burst from her surprised everyone, but not more so herself, even as she felt it rise in her strangled throat from her chest. The room rocked around her as she flung her arms around Druig, needing to hold on, her nails digging into his jacket as she breathed him in and felt him around her as she trembled. Until it left her and she sagged against him, every flittering thought filtering out until she was left with, her brain falling to static and lulled by an internal pulse that dictated she do nothing but stay like this with him as his hand stroked her hair, whispering things she couldn’t hear.
It took tremendous strength to rip herself away from the physical comfort, pulling back to stare at him helplessly as Eros openly observed them from the side of the room he’d been thrown to amidst Makkari’s outburst. She wiped at her red eyes with the sleeve of her arm.
Her mouth curved into a lopsided smile as messy as her feelings. I’m sorry.
“Makkari,” Druig said, gentle and sweet, cupping her face to wipe against the tear that slipped down her flushed cheek. Her eyes fell to his lips. “There is nothing to be sorry for.”
He turned, however, and she lost the touch of his hand on her skin. Addressing Eros, he said, “You used her.” Druig’s words were laced with dangerous venom. “I told you not to–”
“Nonsense, my friend.” Eros waved his hand as if to dismiss praise. “I’ve simply opened her up to you.”
“So, this isn’t real?” Druig countered testily, clenching his jaw.
Eros slid his gaze from Druig to Makkari, then back again, still with that lazy successful smile. “You tell me.”
“We are already open,” Druig ground out. “We need no assistance.”
“No? None at all? Have you not fallen to her feet for thousands of years, showering her with adoration, refusing to pry her mind in fear of discovery her sharing only a morsel of the love you burn for her?”
Druig’s face turned to colour, nearing Thanos purple. He glared at Eros so scorchingly it nearly convinced Makkari he’d been possessed by a phantom Ikaris. “Get out!”
Makkari turned away to stare at the floor, not interested in the rest of this conversation when Eros protested, though she glanced back a moment later, watching Druig throw a hand out, using his powers to forcibly move Eros out of the room and shut the door with surprise.
They both let out a sigh of relief Makkari didn’t realize they’d been holding now that they were left alone.
I didn’t think you could do that.
I didn’t think so either, he admitted. He is not as strong as us, somehow. I don’t know why.
It is then her mind cleared and she reasoned there was more that had been unsaid, though not from her. It was Druig with secrets, just as off-kilter as she was.
Why does Eros bother you so much? She finally asked. What did he do?
History proved Druig was not one to easily take being manipulated as one more comfortable being the one in control.
The same trick he played with you. He let out a sigh. He pulled it out of me.
Was that a bad thing? Makkari swallowed nervously. Does that frighten you?
“No,” he said. It wasn’t anything I didn’t already know.
Which was what, Druig?
That I have loved you since we existed. Before you ever noticed. Before we even knew ourselves.
Makkari shook her head at him, fond yet so incredibly exasperated. Her hand inched across the couch to lace her fingers with his, the slowest she’d ever moved. She studied him and knew at once that he lied. It did scare Druig, it shook him to his core. That after thousands of years of their closeness, a line crossed by accident. His intention behind his flirting was more than serious. Their old game had fallen to dust.
He tracked her movement as she brought his white knuckles to her lips. She dared him to look away as she let her grip fall.
And you think that means your love is real and mine is not? That it is not the same? That this is all one-sided?
Druig, you never asked. She barely suppressed a grin as she thought of what she had just told Eros, ‘I love him when he is wrong.’ His brows scrunched in perplexion as she lightly laughed and signed, And until right now, I didn’t know you loved me either.
“Makkari–” She reached up and silenced him, two fingers against his lips, to stop whatever he was going to say.
You know me, she reassured with melting adoration, unable to help herself. Your beautiful, beautiful Makkari.
His reaction was better than Makkari could’ve ever imagined. Druig was speechless in revered silence. It was as powerful as her emotive sonic boom. Without wasting another moment, Makkari kissed him, reaching up to drag her hands in his hair, having him just as desperately as she had wanted before Eros ever entered the room. He pulled her flush to him. They have been together before and it had always been wonderful, but this one was different. It was healing and he sighed against her in a way she felt leaked out exhaustion that had been pent up forever.
The truth was simple as it was. It didn’t matter who loved first and who loved last, and it didn’t matter how close or how far they had to be to share it. Makkari didn’t care, as long as that love was theirs alone, as long as it stayed true.