voyagers | [party post] come sail away with me

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[party post] come sail away with me

You've come through a door, and you are on a boat. Specifically, you're on a cruise ship in the middle of some giant body of water. You've come through the door behind you which is attached to nothing and may now be locked. It's relatively empty as giant as it appears to be. The only other passengers that are here appear to also have come through the door for the most part and it is not nearly enough to fill up this entire cruise ship.

Also, who knows who the hell is driving this thing since all of the employees appear to be either ghosts or holograms...

Is this your first time here or your hundredth time here? Do you want a drink or a dip in the pool? Is it day or night? Do you stumble on your room or some other situation either fun or painful within its many rooms, shops, and facilities? Do you run into someone you know or a complete stranger?

The possibilities are unlimited!

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Ethan is struck between wanting to leave as soon as possible and never wanting to leave this place. He hasn't seen anyone he knows on it, but a cruise ship is largely preferable to what would be waiting for him on the other side of that door. Well, that is, assuming the cruise ship doesn't explode or turn into a horror cruise ship or that the cruise ship isn't leading them straight into hell or something like that. Everyone else that he has met who has been kidnapped too, they seem to be pretty good people at least, but he misses his brothers and he-- he really misses people that he will never, ever see again. He said goodbye to them for forever, for good when Chicago ended, because Rifts can lead anywhere but the likelihood of their leading to the same place is so tiny.

Ethan said goodbye to Elena when Chicago ended-- when the world ended, and he still isn't sure how-- how he managed to say the words or how either of them managed to walk away.

He is leaning against the railing, staring down into the water as it rushes by the ship. His hands grip hold of the metal at the side, and he releases a long breath. There is still plenty of this ship to explore, and he had his room with his name on it, but he finds he's constantly drifting back up to the deck, to the night sky (though sometimes it is day) with its stars twinkling, to the sound of the water rushing by. Once he saw dolphins swimming along the side of the ship too, they didn't look like any kind of dolphins he's seen before (neon in color, glowing like they were radioactive), but he keeps coming back, hoping to see them again.

"There you are."

Elena has lost track of the amount of time she has been on this ship. Long enough to thoroughly and properly celebrate the birthday of one Caroline Forbes along with Bonnie Bennett. She hasn't panicked, because -- well, if anyone has had experience with rabbit holes by now, it's Elena Gilbert, and she has more or less told herself this experience is similar, and eventually, she will be led back to where she came from. Where she came from is Chicago, in a world that hasn't ended, and she'd only just seen Ethan moments before she was pulled into the ship.

That may have something to do with why she doesn't look stricken or shocked to see him. She looks relieved and almost expectant, though not without some of her concern, since this is unlike any rabbit hole she has found herself in. It is with that relief she picks up her pace and makes her way over to him, sliding her arms around his neck and kissing him softly with that relief before she hugs him properly. "I was beginning to think it'd only taken me," Elena says, and when she pulls back, she gives him a once over. "Are you okay?"

Ethan said goodbye to Elena forever.

They weren't ever going to see each other again. It was the last interaction that they had period, that was supposed to be it. No matter how little it made sense. No matter how-- how impossible it was to do it, they did, and it is why he is standing there in shock when he sees her, because he hasn't seen-- Because they said goodbye for good, and he didn't know if she would be okay, if she would make it. He didn't think that he would ever see her again, but she is walking toward him looking relieved and expectant, and he can't find the words at first or the ability to react.

He swallows thickly, finally is about to open his mouth to say something when she slides her arms around his neck and then........ her mouth is on his. Her mouth is on... his? Did she miss? Is she-- No, she doesn't seem apologetic at all. She's kissing him. She is-- Elena Gilbert is-- His best friend (who he has been in love with for... a really long time) is kissing him, and he never thought in a million years--

His eyes burn but he kisses her back in that brief moment, that brief moment that lasts so long in his head, stretches out into infinity, and then she pulls back. Ethan is still staring even after she speaks, because she was just kissing him and he never thought he'd see her again and he doesn't even begin to know where to start-- It is why he just shakes his head slightly, swallowing again thickly. His eyes are burning harder still. His heart beat quickening in-- He can feel it like a hard thrumming in his chest, all over.

"I don't--" Ethan swallows thickly again, fighting the emotion in his throat as he rests his hand against her arm because that takes precedence over the-- even over the kissing. He never thought he would ever kiss her, never thought he would ever express those feelings that he has for her, never... even imagined that she might feel the same toward him, that she might want to kiss him. but she just did

and he thought he'd said goodbye to her for always, and his life stopped making sense that day when it all fell apart. "I never thought... I would see you again."

Edited 2014-02-24 04:52 (UTC)

Elena's day before she was brought to the ship was a fairly uneventful one.

It's precisely because it was uneventful that she enjoyed it so much. She'd stayed over at the Hales, something she has grown accustomed to doing, and Ethan made them breakfast once they'd woken up, something he has grown accustomed to doing. They'd spent their Sunday lounging around and indulging in the beautiful prospect of doing absolutely nothing after several chaotic weeks, a chaos Chicago is wont to have, considering it is filled to the brim with rifts.

Filled to the brim with rifts, but it still exists. The concept that it doesn't, that it someday wouldn't, is something she would have the hardest time processing. It would break her heart, as does his statement he never thought he would see her again. Their having said goodbye and that being that. She wouldn't understand saying goodbye to Ethan. As soon as she pulls back, though, Elena is able to catch his expression and she immediately understands something is happening.

(All the things he never said in his universe are all the things that she has been told in hers. All the things they never did are the things that she has done.)

Her hands remain on his shoulder blades, which she had placed there to brace herself. Confusion momentarily crosses her face. "But I just -- " saw you. There is no use in finishing that sentence, since that is clearly not what has happened for him. Elena's hands slowly drop from his shoulders as she plants the heels of her feet back on the ground. This is Ethan. She has absolutely no doubt that it is. An Ethan that recognizes her, except. "We're not from the same world," she surmises softly after a moment. "Are we?"

Elena doesn't know why it hadn't occurred to her. She has just gotten back from spending time with Bonnie and Caroline, both of which came from completely different universes and points in time.

Edited 2014-02-24 05:08 (UTC)

Ethan can't even imagine a world where he said all of those things that he has known for such a long time at the dance, and he felt that she never-- that she couldn't possibly feel the same way toward him. So many things happened that kept them apart too on top of that, and he could never imagine a world where she would walk up and kiss him like it's normal, like she wants to, like she wants him like that. He loves her. He was always going to love her even if she didn't feel the same, but-- but the idea of a world where she does is--

It's amazing and hard to wrap his head around. There's this ache spreading through his chest, and his eyes are burning still.

He sees the confusion as it crosses her face, but then it is followed by understanding too. They both know so much about Rifts, about different worlds that they've heard about situations like this before, but it is still strange to think this is an Elena who knows him but has-- obviously has a different relationship with him even if it only the added kissing to-- to it. His hand slides behind his neck as he shakes his head in answer. "I don't-- I don't think so. You don't know how--" His voice cuts off. "How amazing it is to see you," Ethan says softly, and then through all the emotion and the confusion and the everything, he looks up at her, something like ache and a hope and just a wonderment in his gaze. "Do we... kiss often in your world?"

But God, it is... amazing to see her again, and he reaches his hand out once more to rest it against her shoulder as if assuring himself she is real.

Elena has lived enough time in Chicago now to understand things that would've thoroughly confused her previously. Concepts as time travel, alternate timelines, alternate universes, are things that don't quite faze her anymore. It doesn't mean that it can't catch her by surprise when it applies to her, specifically. The way his voice cuts off makes her chest ache, and she slips her hand gently against his neck once he does the same. "I don't think I do," she answers, just as softly. She can tell by the look on his face alone that it has been some time -- and that itself is something she can't quite grasp -- but she just saw him. Or a version of him. This is where it gets fuzzy.

Elena looks up at him in time to meet his eyes, and she opens her mouth to respond, but it takes several moments for her to do so. "I -- yeah," she answers with a small, breathed out laugh. It's become so normal to her she had almost forgotten why he would look so surprised. "Yeah, you -- he? -- sort of make it a point to do it every day."

She glances at the hand he places on her shoulder, before she lifts her gaze back up at him, worry darkening her expression.

Ethan swallows thickly again, and he can still feel the burning in his eyes especially as her hand slips up against his neck. He looks at her again at what she says, and there is so much. Ethan doesn't know how to put it to words. He still can't think of that last moment that he ever saw her without-- Honestly, he still doesn't know how he walked away. Part of him wanted to stay, stay even knowing what that meant, stay with her and go... with her, but so much had happened and everything was complicated and it was the end of the world.

He laughs too softly, shaking his head again at the thought, the amazing, impossible thought. "I never thought-- Well, I never told you. I didn't think you felt the same, and maybe you didn't, but I never... said," Ethan says, and he wonders what would have happened if he had. He doesn't-- He regrets not saying even if he was right about her not feeling the same, he regrets... not telling her and now doesn't know if he'll ever see the Elena from his own world again, but it doesn't mean it's not absolutely amazing to see her, to see this one. "Look, do... you want to get a drink? I feel like-- like there are a lot of questions on both sides."

And-- and alcohol might help, his hand is still resting against her shoulder, just grateful she is alive, that he is seeing her alive, that he is seeing her at all.

Elena looks at him skeptically. She doesn't think it's possible, for her to not have feelings for Ethan. She may not have understood them at different points in time. She may not have realized them, or acknowledged them due to those complications, but even the Elena in his world had been upset at the thought of his kissing Rebekah, for reasons she never went on to examine. All the same, despite how distressing that in itself could be, it's his statement about never seeing her again that's at the forefront, and before she can articulate any of this, Elena glances up again at the offer of drinks.

"Yeah," she says after a stunned moment. She does have questions, and if drinking might help with the answers, she would want to facilitate that. "I don't know my way around here, but it looks... like you do."

How long has he been here? Another question that she adds to the list of questions that keep adding up in her head.

Ethan sees the skepticism in her expression, and it is strange and new for him to think that-- that maybe she did have feelings for him like he did for her-- does for her. The feelings don't go away, and he could never imagine not having them for her either. Through everything and all the distance and finding each other again, he always had feelings for her, he was in love with her. Ethan knew it the moment of that dance, and he never-- could never put it to words.

"I've... been here a little while," he admits, letting out a long breath as he looks at her, can't stop looking at her even as he walks up on to the deck where there's a bar near the pool. It's so amazing to see her in the flesh, to see her beside him, to know that she is real There are a lot of bars in this place so at any given time, one is not far from alcohol. "Not my first time here either."

Maybe the door would open now, but he's not entirely certain what it would open to.

Elena falls into step beside him, letting him lead the way. She is quiet for a moment following his admission, and it isn't until they've reached the bar she looks up again. Whatever brought them here, the place itself is beautiful. Elena takes in the lights reflected on the pool and the bar adjacent to it, along with the view. An ocean that spreads out for miles and miles. She wonders if that's all there is. If the world itself is an ocean, and the ship will always be adrift in it. She supposes those aren't questions that could be easily answered, if at all, unless one had spent a certain amount of time here.

Even then.

Sometimes there's just the mystery.

"Wait, so you were returned to your world, and then it brought you back here again?" Elena asks, her voice careful and soft as she looks at him. She tilts her head slightly to the side while doing so. She has been regarding him thoughtfully herself, as though attempting to find something that will differentiate him from the Ethan that she knows, the Ethan that has been left at the other side of the door.

Edited 2014-02-24 06:19 (UTC)

Ethan has seen the view of it all before. He keeps staring at her as they walk, barely looking ahead enough to see where his feet are going. It is beautiful, the cruise ship. There are so many parts to it, and even though he has been here awhile, he isn't sure he's seen it all. He doesn't know that anyone can, because there are times where things feel like they change places or where new ones just appear out of thin air. It's a dynamic, mysterious place, and for some reason, it brings people on board without their say so.

And doesn't let them go again until it says so.

"It let me return to the exact moment that I'd left my world, and then months and months later, I ended up here again," Ethan says after the end of the world, after the forever goodbyes. Maybe that is why he hasn't tried so hard to get back, to open the door again, because so much is uncertain and he has always had that habit of avoiding which he's-- he's only marginally better at especially after the big reveal about his father. He sits at the bar, and while there is no bartender, there is plenty of alcohol so he mixes them both a drink and then sets a few bottles between them in case they want more. Even if he's not-- not certain where to start, but he is still staring at her in amazement, burning returns to his eyes as he takes a sip of the drink. "This... is your first time then."

Here. Maybe it'll only be the one time or maybe she'll be back.

The funny thing about alternate timelines, is that one single moment can transform absolutely everything. For Elena, it was a Storm that came to pass. For Ethan, it was apparently -- she still hasn't quite managed to put the pieces of the puzzle together, though it starts to become clearer to her the more he alludes to it. She remains standing, at first, just watching him mix together the drinks. The confusion remains in her expression, a subtle thing; soft frown lines creasing her forehead, her lips parted slightly as though she is attempting to formulate words but none of them will come.

They're just not there.

It is only until he places the drinks and the respective bottles at the table Elena moves to sit at the bar along with him, sitting down on one of the stools. She nods wordlessly in answer that it is her first time, but that's not what's -- she can't help that it's not what's on her mind. "The exact moment that you'd left your world?" she asks with trepidation. She isn't sure what that means, but the sense of foreboding grows inside of her, coupled with the very first thing he said to her the moment he saw her. "Ethan, what happened?"

It wasn't just a rabbit hole. It wasn't even a rift. No, it is bigger than that. She can tell.

Ethan takes a deeper drink from the glass in his hand as she looks at him, and he shakes his head slightly since that hadn't come out right completely. "I meant the cruise ship dropped me back into the same moment that it kidnapped me from," he says, but the trepidation in her voice is-- well, it is more than warranted given what ended up happening. Leaving his world, their world is-- it's scarily accurate for what ended up happening, and his chest aches deeply with it as his eyes burn with it when she asks that question.

He takes another drink from the glass, closing his eyes before he looks at her again.

How does he put it to words what happened? There's just no easy way to say it so he finally blurts it out. "It was... the apocalypse. Rift activity spiked suddenly, and we had warning that the end was coming. Rifts were going to swallow up the whole world," he says, and his chest aches, because how does it-- how does it even make sense? But it's what happened. It happened. He was there. "Scientists said there'd-- Rifts would open for a brief amount of time, letting small groups go through to God knows where. I don't even know. The last time the cruise ship took me, it took me before I could see where I ended up, and it's been-- I've been here for a very long time."

For weeks, months maybe. It's hard to keep track. This place doesn't have calendars. His voice aches with it. "When I last saw you, we-- we were saying goodbye." His eyes burn further, and he downs his drink before he looks over at her, ache in his gaze, amazement that she is-- she's here beside him having a drink. "Forever."

"That's not possible."

The words spill from her mouth choppily, raw; they only do so after a lengthy silence in which his words smack her with the reality of it. Of course. Of course. People had long since spoken of the rifts having consequences, and fearing those consequences, but none of them had imagined it could lead to the end of the world. Elena certainly didn't, but maybe they should have. It makes so much sense once he speaks long enough to say it. It makes so much sense, but her head does not easily accept it. She's only just sat down and already Elena is standing up again, her hand momentarily cupping her own mouth as she lets out a breath. The world was ending and they were saying goodbye.

And maybe that's what she thinks isn't possible. Not so much the end of the world, but their saying goodbye, except -- maybe he is right. Maybe things were different in that world. Maybe that makes sense in all the ways it doesn't, but her heart doesn't believe that, or it has a very hard time of doing so.

Elena finally turns to him again, the ache in her gaze, the utter confusion of something she simply hasn't understood. She shakes her head for a moment, though it's clear she believes him. He would have no reason to lie, and regardless of timelines and universes, Elena trusts Ethan to tell her the truth. "How did we -- ? "

Does she really want to know?

"I wish it wasn't."

It's Ethan's response as he turns to her. The sound of her voice hurts like this ache that opens up in the center of his chest, swallowing up his heart. His eyes burn further as he looks at her, watching her reaction, wishing he could tell her it was something else (but what on else would tear them away from each other forever, for good? he still isn't sure how they managed to say goodbye that day except there was no choice). Parts of him still regrets the impossible choice, regrets walking away from her that day. He watches her as she stands up, and his chest opens up with that ache as he reaches out to rest his hand against her arm.

His eyes burn still with the weight and the pain and the grief of it, of all of it. It happened too fast, and there wasn't enough time. He finishes off his drink, and he is really relieved he suggested that they get some, because there's no way he could-- he could say it without drinking.

Ethan keeps his hand against her arm. Even after she turns, he reaches out again to rest his hand there against her, and it only falls down after what she asks. His eyes burn so hard he can feel the tears at the edges of it. Ethan shakes his head. "I still don't really know," he says, voice cracking with it. "How we managed it. The city went into chaos, and it took me awhile to make it into the city from... from my house, but I found you. The city had-- There were things in the sky and I found you staring at one. We hugged, and we went back to your home for the... last time. We drank... and I made you the cookies, and we-- We danced. I don't know how we actually did it. I don't... know. Maybe it was too impossible to-- Couldn't stop crying, because we knew it-- we wouldn't ever see each other again."

He doesn't think he's ever cried as much as he did when he forced himself to walk away that day. Everything had felt so wrong.

Part of Elena regrets it and she has never lived such an experience.

Logically, she understands why the decision had to come to that, even without knowing the full particulars. There are only so many people that can go through a rift together, and they had families they would never leave if they could help it. Something that they could always bond on was how family was the most important thing to them. But they had become family too, and isn't it just like Chicago to make it so that they would have to make such impossible choices? Her eyes close, and she turns back to him as soon as his hand rests on her arm.

Her lashes are wet with tears, her eyes filling once again at the sound of his voice. Something inside of her grows still, softened and pained all at once by the sounds his words make, and the meaning that is inevitably behind them. The things in the sky, the chaos in the city, all of it takes a backseat to the rest of what he is saying. Elena's expression nearly crumples at the mention of those cookies. She knows exactly what he means. "I'm so sorry," she whispers, and at first that is all she can manage. She is sorry he experienced so much loss, lost his home, was faced with so many impossible choices.

She never wants to have to make them.

Elena slips her arms around his neck and brings him over to her to hug him again, tightly and with feeling. "It's okay," she says against his neck. The situation isn't, but the choice he -- they -- made. She understands. It breaks her heart but she understands.

They were-- are family too. It is why he first made those cookies for her, because he'd thought of her as family for such a long time. This was an impossible choice, but it was one they were forced to make. He still regrets it impossibly so. Ethan hasn't been able to think of it again, think of that moment again or he would have gone running back to her, wouldn't have been able to stop himself. Time was running out, and there was never-- never enough time. Never enough of anything, and it was all over too soon. He doesn't know where that door leads, doesn't know what's on the other side of it.

He sees the tears in her eyes, against her lashes. Ethan feels the tears burning at the edges of his own eyes as he swallows thickly with the emotion welling up tightly in his throat. He sees the way her expression nearly crumples, and he knows-- knows that is the same. There is a cookie recipe for that Ethan too, and he taught it to her and it is important. Ethan swallows thickly, and the tears finally slip down his face when she says she's sorry. "I am too," he says shakily.

He is sorry--

Ethan is sorry for so much, so much that can't be changed, so much-- his expression crumples when she slips her arms around his neck, and he buries his face against her shoulder there. "Things were-- They'd been a big mess, and there was never enough time," he says sharply. "There never would have been enough time. I regret it. Sometimes. Walking away." He doesn't know how he did it.

Can never know. His legs shaking with the-- the refusal to leave her, but there was no other choice. The world was ending. It'd gone to hell, and-- it is the sad reality of it.

A quietness takes over, and in the quietness Elena lifts herself up, using her thumbs to gently wipe away the tears that slip down his face. Never mind that her own cheeks are wet. She pays no mind to them as she lovingly catches the wetness of his own cheeks in her palms. She shakes her head and leans in to press her forehead against his neck, her arms sliding further around him. She swallows back a sound. "I know why you did," she whispers softly.

Without his telling her, Elena knows why.

She is failing to understand her own ability to walk away from him. To let him walk away from her, but that's just -- it's like he said. It was the sad reality of it, regardless of whether it makes sense to her or not. "As impossible as it would've been, I know why. I couldn't leave Jeremy. You couldn't leave your brothers. I get it, Ethan," she says, even as the thickness in her voice threatens to stifle it altogether, wobbly with the strength of the grief at something she never really lost.

So why does it feel like she did? Like they both did?

Ethan shakes his head as his eyes burn further, and he looks at her through those tears. He lifts up a hand to wipe away at the tears at her face after a moment. The whole of him broken over by the weight and the strength of what he is feeling as he feels her forehead press against his neck. His arms wind tightly around her too, pulling her in against his chest, because he-- he knows in his head why they did, why they had to.

It was impossible choice, and they couldn't-- couldn't leave their family, but-- but they're family, and it wasn't okay. None of it was okay.

His expression crumples again against her, and he is still shaking his head as he speaks in this really wobbly voice. "It didn't make any sense," he says, and there's grief in the sound of his voice, loss in the way that it cracks in between them. "I knew why, but it didn't make sense, walking away from you forever. It still doesn't make sense to me, but I've... got to walk back through that door someday to a world where you don't exist." He doesn't even know what world it is, but he knows it is one that doesn't have her in it.

And the world makes no sense because he knows that-- it's-- His arms tighten around her further, pulling her in against his chest as his face crumples against her again.

I've... got to walk back through that door someday to a world where you don't exist.

Her face finally crumples against him, arms tightening around his neck as though with the action alone she can make that not true. The thought of it breaks her, and it goes against everything she believes, everything she knows to be true. Everything she lives, day in and day out. Every day of her life. If the world came to an end for Ethan, does that mean it will come to an end in her world, too? The saturation of rifts continues to be a real problem people do not have a solution for. Will she be faced with the exact same impossible choice?

The thought isn't one she wants to have. At the same time, it's as though she can't escape it. Her eyes shut closed tightly against the warmth of his skin, her fingers curling lightly into his shirt at the back. "It doesn't make sense to me, either," she says, her voice barely audible and barely steady. It ruptures with the weight of the truth, and the reality that he has lived, which is so different from her own. She shakes her head stubbornly against him because it doesn't.

It doesn't make sense to her. It can't.

Ethan leans into her touch as her arms tighten around his neck, and his own tighten around her like he can make it not true if he holds on to her tighter. He knows that he can't. The reality that he lived through makes-- it made no sense. The only reason he thinks he has been able to move on with that reality is because it is so impossible to fully wrap his head around that he would never see her again, and it ended up not being true. She's here even if she's not the Elena from his world, even if--

At what she says, his arms pull her in more tightly to him, and he slides his hands up and down her back as it ruptures in his chest too. He nods when she says it makes no sense to her either, and he doesn't want her to have to worry about it. Things are-- they're different enough in her world. Maybe there's still hope, maybe-- Maybe a lot of things, but he feels her shake her head against him, and his eyes burn more. His hand slips through her hair, wishing it weren't true. But it is.

"Do you see now why-- ...why I said we should have a drink while we talked about it?" Ethan asks with that ache in his voice even as he laughs softly, achingly, pressing his forehead against her shoulder before he lifts his head up to look at her. He slides his hand over her face briefly, still with that wonderment, that amazement. "We were wrong though. I did-- I did get to see you again." His face nearly crumples again, but he fights it.

And he doesn't know if he can hope that-- that this won't be the last time instead (and it's still not the Elena from his world, the one he never told... never told how he feels).

No, she isn't the Elena from his world.

She can't tell him what became of her, where she is, or what happened to her after he walked away from her that day. She has no way of knowing, though she can imagine, how destroyed she was as she closed that door, sliding down against it as her legs betrayed her and her heart broke. She doesn't know if he will truly never see her again. Doesn't know what will become of either of them once the door opens and they are left to walk through it. There are so many things she doesn't know, and the uncertainties press down on her chest until it aches with them all. Things are very different in her world, but right now it is hard to remember them.

It's hard to do anything but feel the ache as it rests in between them.

A small, choked laugh leaves her as well, as she pulls back to look at him, too. She nods against his hand, leaning into the warmth of it because she does. She sees. And it is why she will be leading them back to it because she thinks she may need now a heavy drink herself. "We've been wrong about a lot of things," she says softly. Her teary eyes lift up to meet his, still leaning into the palm of his hand. "With the rifts, we never -- we never know, Ethan. Don't lose hope."

Elena doesn't want him to. She doesn't want to lose it herself, even for something she can't possibly know or understand.

Ethan couldn't think about it as he was walking away from her, walking away with every force of will that he could muster. He couldn't think about it because her face alone was enough to break his heart, shatter it completely, and then walking away from her on top of all that, it-- it destroyed him, and he was-- He was destroyed as he waited for the world to end. Ethan thinks they both were. No one is fine at the apocalypse, but saying goodbye to each other was like being shattered and some things are so impossible to recover from.

There's a sharp, heavy ache, but the sound of her choked laugh makes him smile and makes his heart ache further, break all over again, because it's Elena and she sounds so sad and so upset.

It'll never not break his heart. His thumb slides over the side of her face before he finally lets his hand fall back down as she leads them back to it, to the bar and the alcohol lined up on top of it. Ethan turns with his elbows resting against the top of it, and his eyes burn as he fills up another drink for himself. "I'll try," Ethan says achingly quiet. "But it is hard. A lot of things happened even before..."

The end of the world. He swallows thickly then turns to look at her, and finally there's a smile even in all that pain and aching. "So... we were really together? ...are really together in your world?"

Ethan's voice trails off, and Elena turns to look at him once again.

"I know," she says softly. At least, if their universes share some kind of parallels, Elena knows what some of these complications were. Complications, distance, misunderstandings, all-around-Chicago-ness. Ethan refusing to stand still and Elena refusing to let go of things she should've long let go of. It was never perfect. Life is never meant to be. They both have carried their sadness and their guilt and their issues for a very long time. She looks down at her glass, hand circling it to bring it closer to her. There's a pause, before she brings it to her lips and downs it in one go. The alcohol burns in her lungs, but it's a good burn, and one that she needs at the moment.

Elena scrunches up her face all the same, before she places the empty glass back down on the wooden counter, and she looks up at him in time to catch that smile. She lifts her eyebrow, amusement threatening to seep into her expression. "Is it really that hard to believe?" she asks, already serving them another round. She places the bottle of liquor back down onto the counter, and takes a deep breath.

"Yes," she answers after a moment. "We're really together. There was this ball at the Kashtta Tower that made things ... weird, for a while, but we never stopped seeing each other. Then a freak Storm came not too long after that, and we were the only ones at Martha's house when it happened, and ... "

Her voice trails off, and she clears her throat. Well. Things happened.

She picks up her drink again.

Ethan nods when she says she knows, and he stares at his own hands for a moment. There were complications and distance and misunderstandings. There was his father-- Finding out about his father, he distanced himself and went back to his avoidance and his running in this intense way that no one could have been prepared for. He never knew that was waiting there for him to find out one day, and it destroyed so many of his relationships. Ethan was just relieved Elena was still there when he-- when he finally came back, that she was ready to take him back with open arms and to listen to why-- to what happened that made him hide to start with when they'd always been in each other's lives more and more.

Ethan looks over at her when she lifts her eyebrow like that, and then he looks down, releasing a breath before he nods. "Yeah, a bit. I was convinced you didn't feel the same, and maybe you didn't. I never.... brought it up," he says, shaking his head, and the regret is clear in his voice. Even if she hadn't felt the same, he wanted her to know, but just... never said. He takes a drink from his glass as he looks at her when she explains. The tiny smile on his face widening except when she mentioned the ball.

"Yes, that was... the moment that I realized I was in love with you," he says softly with a tiny laugh as he shakes his head a bit, because he is slowly realizing he just said that out loud for the very first time. But it seems like she may already know. "But we never had a Storm of any kind, and-- ...what comes after the and?"

There's a tiny smirk that widens on his face as she picks up her drink again.

He is thinking maybe they kissed for the first time. Not-- not realizing how explosive it would be in those settings, completely private, no interruptions, after all the building (~~three damn years~~).

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