i know that the sun is here with me | december catch-all

[terriblepurpose]

Who: Paul Atreides, Ortus Nigenad, and you
What: December catch-all, open and closed prompts
When: December
Where: Various
Content warnings: Grief over loss of a parent, eugenics, psychological horror, child abuse, child death

Comments

[terriblepurpose]

Paul fights another urge to bury his face in his palms, but he does scrub at one cheek, his mouth twisting wryly upwards on one side.

"I was trying to tell a joke," he says, resigned to the consequences of his own reputation, "There's no cake butler. Do you see anywhere that one could be?"

They don't even exist here, although Paul can't speak for the rest of the Imperium. For all he knows, cake butlers are common on some particularly decadent world, but while Caladan is rich, it is not as refined as some of its cousins.

"If you don't want to do this, you don't have to. I'm not here to make you uncomfortable, or to feel like - there's anything you're lacking."

[justoscar]

"Weiss from Team RWBY has a cake butler, and you wouldn't expect him!"

Except...Klein was a regular butler that stayed at the Schnee Mansion in Atlas-- and wasn't relevant here. Paul can just live with the knowledge that Oscar is more afraid to order his own food than the prospect of attempting a coup.

Oscar looked around regardless, rubbing at one of his arms restlessly while he searched for a stranger he might have to make a request from. Butlers, man... It was like they were multi-talented super spies that could do anything, from the way Oscar acted.

"... It's fine," Oscar said finally, with a sheepish look. "I just don't want to embarrass you in front of your dad by using the wrong fork or something."

[terriblepurpose]

Being in Trench for only a year shouldn't have had such an effect on Paul's sense of place in the world, but he has proven to be more adaptable than he ever thought he could be. The divisions of rank he'd placed between himself and others had faded away in the absence of anything to reinforce them, and he realizes, watching Oscar squirm, that he hadn't considered that anyone might still see him as - elevated, rarefied, held above the common person.

It's already cold here. It makes him feel colder, and smaller, and somehow more alone. He doesn't know why, yet. It's the sort of thing he knows he'll have to think about to understand, and there's no time and place for it here.

"You're not going to embarrass me," Paul says, quietly, sitting up and tugging his coat straighter as he hears heavy footsteps in the woods announcing the approach of the true guest of honour here, "And there are no forks, so don't worry so much."

[justoscar]

It was hard not to, not when he had observed the powers of Paul's social grace firsthand over the past winter. Especially not when Chara, the extraordinary kid that carried both immense power and pain in turn, seemed to have faith in no one but also seemed to want to have faith in Paul.

He held a hand up against his chest, not wanting to get stabbed through again, and took a deep breath to steady himself.

"Right. No forks."

He exhaled. The last time he had met a man of political importance, that man carried himself as if he carried the entirety of the world on his shoulders. Fitting, from the little he knew of Earthly folklore and the giant Atlas that was told in the most ancient of their stories. Sometimes he wondered if there was a connection-- but, for now.

"I trust you, Paul. If you say that it's fine... then it's fine."

[terriblepurpose]

Whatever answer Paul might have to that is lost in the crack of a branch nearby. Paul stills with his hands on his knees, and his father steps into view.

Paul has done this a few times by now. He doesn't expect it to get any easier with familiarity. All he can hope for is to catch new details in new lights, and this time, it's the wear mark on the strap of the satchel where his father thumbs it, a gesture that Paul wants to imprint on his heart like it's imprinted on the strap.

"Hello," the Duke Leto Atreides says, curiously, "I didn't know we were expecting a guest."

[justoscar]

It wasn't often Oscar met someone experienced enough to have gone a little gray on Remnant. It happened, but in the countryside and in certain careers it was uncommon to get old enough to feel the effects of time without having faced crippling trials to get there. He had jumped at the sound of a branch cracking underfoot, and had busied himself with smoothing out his jacket when the Duke made his appearance.

Oscar cast him a bright, awkward little grin and waved.

"Um, hi." He said. "I, uh, kinda dropped in."

[terriblepurpose]

"I'd have to assume that," Leto says, with a tinge of dryness that isn't unfriendly, "There's not much in the way of habitation out this way."

"This is Oscar Pine, sir." Paul slips into the conversation with the smoothness of rehearsal. "He's a friend of mine. I thought we might be able to invite him to eat with us."

"A friend of yours." Still without ire, but not without raised eyebrows, Leto takes a seat on the log perpendicular to the one Paul is sitting on. "I suppose you'll have an explanation for that. Well - do you eat fish, Oscar Pine?"

[justoscar]

[Yes, Paul. What was the explanation? Oscar chuckled, feeling sheepish, and replied quickly. ]

Sure! Fish is always great!