Chaos-Two picked their way out of the tunnel, sniffing at the grass and staring at flowers and bugs, utterly enraptured. They struggled to identify colors after so many months looking through a blurry haze of green, with constant headaches and aching from their pelvis up their spine and down their legs.
They let out a babyish bleat and bolted, swinging his head around and running rather clumsily, exploring their new range of movement as they bucked and pranced before tumbling down the side of a hill, their depth perception askew.
Down they went, tumbling through the grass until they came to a stop at the bottom, grass seeds covering their pelt and covered in different colors, stained by the flowers they'd accidentally crushed. It was like learning to run all over again, relearning their limits and trying to figure out how to see.
It was weird, being able to see things from so far away, and it was difficult to determine where things were compared to them. They could see Vargas clearly from this far away, and watch Khavur's colors change and watch their limbs move... it was amazing.
They deserved to be a little ridiculous.
The magic fetched back wellness, health -- greater than health. Life, joy. Maximus had already said they were okay, so the magic use was kind of redundant, and yet...
Khavur's small-horned head burst out into laughter.
Had he-- it forgotten?! What it losing a head?!?! No, not at all, Khavur was fine. More than fine. And so was Maximus. They both deserved to be ridiculous.
Khavur came towards Maximus more cautiously, his pelt a striped orange blaze against the field. "YOU CAN RUN!" He bellowed with his large-horned head. Then, with the same head, he wondered aloud: "Can you see?"
The Leviathan followed along at a more sedate pace. He ignored them running, and tried to ignore the laughing; he was not going to scold them for such a thing but, somehow, it made him uncomfortable.
It was perhaps ironic that it wasn't particularly judgment on his part that made him disapprove of their joyous abandon: it was some lingering form of fear. Vargas was of an era where such things would have gotten a creature struck, killed. They were soldiers, not children. Laughter was reserved for mocking or for triumph, not carefree innocence. Innocence meant that they wouldn't survive. Happiness was the mark of the weak. Vargas's instinct (drawn from memory) warned him that such things would result in a swift strike. And like any experience struck hard into the mold of the parent, the temptation was there to drive it into the children, as well: fear driving fear, as if Vargas somehow felt some other, more ominous parent might descend from the sky and strike Khavur and Chaos-Two down simply for laughing, if he himself did not.
He refrained. He did not even comment on it: the dislike was so faint, the vague worry so distant, that he could ignore it. He was Master; he could simply guard them, stalking along, keeping an eye out for the herds of massive Meadow Deer or encroaching hostile Gembound. But the unsettled sensation was there, though he ignored it.
He said nothing, in fact, bar to call out eventually in a tone of forced indifference:
@V-Chaos-Two
V-Chaos-Two grinned up at Khavur, glancing between their heads, meeting both sets of eyes,
They turned and bolted off suddenly, laughing,
They were smiling so big that their face hurt as they tore off across the fields, giggling as they watched butterflies fly away, startled by their sudden prancing through the fields. They sat down heavily once they found the spot they remembered, peering down at a butterfly and resisting the urge to sneeze as it flew up and onto their nose, confusing them for a flower.
Chaos-Two looked over at Khavur and grinned,
Eyes that saw and legs that ran and laughter that resounded in a field of flowers like calling bells, all beautiful, strong, and new. Khavur felt... old. For once, at last, like a forest watching the people grow far beyond itself. How did it feel, to change so much? To know so much? Slowly, Khavur trundled forth, to look where Maximus told him to look. "...it thinks I'm a flower." "You are," he mused. When he at last reached his sibling, Khavur's body instinctively half-curled around them, as though they were still the little lamb Khavur had known... perhaps it had been cycles ago.
The word. "The word..." Khavur echoed, slightly aghast. He longed to know... had he earned it? How long had it taken Maximus to learn it? What had they had to go through all this time...? "I am here. Tell me." It came out in a whisper. This word was their word, not Master Vargas's. The dark purple cloud that loomed should not know of the butterflies' symposium. Khavur leaned his small-horned head in so that Maximus might pass the secret to it inconspicuously.
@Vargas
He glanced to them. For a moment, he thought that Khavur had ignored him; but he saw the head shake. He offered a grunt, irritated; he wanted verbal responses. Yes sir, no sir, all that sort of thing.
For now he let it slide, leaving them to speak--noting again the strange fondness that seemed to bind the siblings. He pondered this, and then set that aside, too, in favor of watching for meadow deer.
He felt nothing, himself, for the brush of grass against his spined forelimbs: give him the unyielding flesh of another behemoth to rend any day. Replace the soft earth underfoot with blood and bones, and give him the scent of smoke instead of this fresh and fragrant air. He wanted the stench of fear, not the smell of flowers. This was not the cave for which Vargas had been made.
And he wasn't sure why the spawn enjoyed it so. He had made them. Perhaps they simply needed a taste of triumph; he had denied them that, after all. But for now he left them to it, and left them to their whispers, and instead stalked to a shadowed point just beneath the treeline a couple dozen yards away. There he watched, and monitored, glowing eyes glinting from beneath the boughs.
@Khavur
Chaos-Two plucked a golden bloom from the grass and reached up, tucking it behind one of Khavur's ears, and picked another one to go behind the ear of the other head.
They plucked flowers from around them and started to braid a crown of flowers, able to see what their hands were doing as they let practice take over, weaving stems in and out, memorizing the look of it. When it was finished, they drew magic to their hands, the crown beginning to glow.
They set it atop Khavur's head and smiled their derpy little grin, tail wiggling,
They weren't butterflies yet, still caterpillars ready to metamorphisize into winged insects of many colors and legs, but soon. They could feel it.
Childishly, Chaos-Two thought they found something more powerful than strength or Chaos. Love.
The secret was bestowed upon them... Love. The word bloomed within the Reaver's chest, grew to a blossom and lunged from his mouths -- "Love." An echo, just to feel its existence in his throats, to affirm it in reality. Love. Yes, it existed, and it tasted sweet and full. More words, more than one, each scented of cherries, nectar, glades and dew. Saccharine droplets ran through each vein and welled in the lungs of the beast -- he exhaled. "It is."
And at last, once again, he was crowned. A king of life and love -- was this not what power ought to be? Shared and made together? Reaver of the Dark Above, but more than that, Holder of Butterflies, and most of all, brother and guardian of Maximus, keeper of forces greater than Master Vargas. Beyond muscle and war. Was it not an apex predator, all-consuming and indestructible? It felt so perfect and right. Pulsation like the Spire, breathing fire into a monstrous, confused heart. Was that... a spark?
Khavur wrapped his arms gently around the sibling bumped against his shoulder. He held them there, overwhelmed for a moment. Slowly, it dripped from his maw... "I love you, Maximus. Flower, butterfly, my Eyes..." Soft. No declaration, only a secret knot in a bond. He didn't expect anyone else to know or understand. The air felt clean, fresh, and empty. Only them, grass, and sunlight.
A few beats past, a cut of time he'd never lose or forget... and then he let go. "Shall we play a game, Maximus?" he whispered. "You or I could run and the other gives chase?" The rest of the world was fading back in bit by bit, albeit retaining some layer of intangibility. Master Vargas was a part of that phantasmal world. Khavur wanted it to at least seem like they were "training" somehow. A game felt like a fun solution to the unfortunate issue of supervision.
It was certainly a good thing the Leviathan could not overhear them. Such things as "love" and their alien affection--the like would have merely baffled him, not angered him, but a name-! Chaos-Two had not yet earned a name. It would have been swiftly quelled, this naming without deserving it! Bah!
-As it was, he was too busy suspiciously scanning the fields. He was guarding them, primarily; they were his spawn, an investment, cogs in the wheels of the forge, and freshly-woken were susceptible to attack.
What they were doing did not matter so much; they could have slept in the grass for all he cared. (But names! The audacity!)
Dehydration was a terrible thing.
@V-Chaos-Two
The curious monstrosity that was V-Chaos-Two showed very little violent tendency, despite the name. Instead, they seemed... opposed to it, weirdly enough. Despite being surrounded by violent people, raised by violent people, thy were just... docile. Like a lamb, maybe, though that could be due to their previously crippled state not allowing them to really be anything else. It took too much energy to be angry all the time or violent all the time.
But for now they leaned back into Khavur, seeking warmth and affection, love in the only place they'd ever found it. In their sibling. Vargas' imperfect creation that Chaos-Two had coaxed kindness out of. It gave them hope.
Chaos-Two might never not feel a tinge of anxiety every time Khavur used the name they'd picked out in preparation for when the day came that they'd truly impressed Vargas enough to earn one. Only the comfort that they were too far away and Khavur's voice quiet and lips sealed kept them from lunging forward and slapping their hands over the other's mouth.
But there was still a chance.
They jumped at Vargas' bellow, about to answer their sibling, looking over (looking! They'd never get used to that,) and nodding,
To Khavur they looked once more, a smile slowly spreading across their face, their little tail going like a rudder,
Because tiring didn't mean Chaos-Two had to sleep outside under a tree or a bush because their legs had reached their limit and refused to move. Tiring now meant their energy waned at acceptable levels, able to be judged not by agony or lack of response, but by lowering fatigue.
But they took off first, laughing as they bolted across the fields, springing like a deer, somehow graceful despite their bulk, head held high to see through the long grasses they bolted through. It was the perfect opportunity to just book it.