WHO Orym and Dorian Storm WHERE Inside the mountain base WHEN Night of March 29, after the Rescue Outlanders From Treants mission WHAT After the rescue, Wild Orym and Prime Dorian are reunited! đź‘€ STATUS Complete ART CREDITHere WARNINGS Smooches!
It took very little time for Orym to seek out Dorian after they had all made it back to their mountain home safe and in one piece. He may have done it sooner, perhaps even when they had been walking back, were it not for the fact that he had been in the shape of a cave bear on the trip back, carrying anyone that had been too hurt to limp through the forest and using his keen perception (this time via his nose, rather than his halfling eyes) to keep tabs on if they were being followed or pursued.
All the while, though, part of his attention had stayed firmly on Dorian. He hadn't been expecting to see him there in the Treant camp, nor had he expected to see Ashton or FCG. For so long, it had only been himself and Chetney to represent Bells Hells. Part of him had long since given up hope that he'd stumble across one of his friends and had made himself comfortable with the fact that this was his life now. It wasn't a bad life, by any means; they had some comforts in the caves and Orym rather enjoyed exploring with Chetney when they were able to. Thought he knew that the wild forest magic that permeated so much of this world was to blame for his suddenly being as druidic as much of Zephrah, he couldn't really complain about that, either.
And then he'd seen a very familiar genasi that, even after all the years apart, seemed to still be able to inspire butterflies in Orym's stomach.
Orym had fought as his halfling self for much of the fight, using his sword and shield with a touch of druidic magic as he'd grown used to. There wasn't time for conversation before they all rushed back to the mountains, but there was ample time now.
Conversation had been his intention, at least, but once Orym found Dorian again after changing his clothes and stashing away his weapons for now, he found himself just looking for a moment, refamiliarizing himself from across the room with one of his best friends. When they had said goodbye back home, Orym would have never imagined that it would be years before they'd be reunited—let alone in another world and for Dorian himself to be from a different world altogether. That didn't really matter to Orym, though. Dorian was Dorian and darn it, he had missed him.
With that thought in mind, Orym found himself moving forward and, the moment he was within reach, wrapped his arms around Dorian's waist in what felt like a long overdue hug.
So this was weird. Like really weird. Not in a bad way, Dorian couldn't really think pessimistically about things—only in sheer panic, and those were different things—but he could still find things weird. And he thought going to space was his ultimate world-shaking trip. Somehow, in every iteration of these Vallo worlds, Dorian was presented with something new that he never thought of before. When Dorian thought about this world, it made sense for Orym to embrace his druidic nature. But there was something about knowing and watching him wild shape into a bear that was not computing in Dorian's mind.
As they walked back through the treacherous forest, Dorian couldn't help but sneak glances at Orym. Or as sneakily as he could for how perceptive his boyfriend was on a good day. He assumed his looks did not go unnoticed, but he appreciated that Orym didn't call him out for it. Not that he ever would either, but this was a different Orym—much like he had been a different Dorian in the flipped world who would have had no problem calling shit out—and Dorian wasn't going to take anything for granted.
He was washing up when he returned, scrubbing his hands free of the guilt of trying to play a lute which had very clearly been a dead tree body; Dorian was never looking at musical instruments the same way twice. But realizing he didn't have anything to dry his hands, he turned, wiping them off on his clothes, which negated the whole point of washing his hands in the first place. He was startled, only briefly seeing Orym there—of course, he was there. He was always there.
With his hands raised in surrender, Dorian said, "I couldn't find—oof." The hug was unexpected but not unwanted. His arms wrapped immediately around Orym, and he squeezed him tight. Even though it had only been a few days without Orym for Dorian, he imagined it was much longer here. At least he wasn't— "Hi. You're not a bear anymore."
Chuckling at that, because how could he not, Orym closed his eyes for just a brief moment, allowing himself to enjoy this hug and Dorian's presence before he backed up and looked up to his friend. "I'm not a bear anymore," he confirmed, as though it needed confirming. "It's funny how it's easier getting around the caves and pathways here at halfling height, rather than as a cave bear. You'd think it'd be the other way around."
None of that, of course, was what Orym wanted to say. Apparently the walk back through the forest and up into the mountains hadn't been enough time to come up with something good, but words had never been his best asset. He had a feeling that saying something grand and perfect wasn't what Dorian expected of him in the first place, though, and instead he just followed Dorian's hi and his babbling about height up with his own, "Hi."
And then, because he had just been part of a group that had been sent out to rescue the group that Dorian had been part of that had been captured, he realized that he probably should have started with making sure Dorian was okay. He seemed okay, but he nevertheless took a step back to give a critical and keen eye over Dorian's body, looking for any hidden injury that he might have overlooked.
"You're okay, yeah?" he asked, just to get input from Dorian, too. Orym held up his hands, as though in offering. "Do you need any healing?"
Dorian let go of Orym immediately when he stepped back. He hadn't given much thought to his own bodily autonomy after being under the scrutiny of giant talking trees. It wasn't until Orym asked him if he was okay, and offered some healing and Dorian actually took stock. He patted his body down like he couldn't trust his own mind to make the call, and that physical proof was necessary. Nothing hurt, nothing was bleeding, he was just unnecessarily dirty—something that Dorian wasn't used to when he had continued to remain clean and fancy in Vallo.
"I'm good, okay. I'm good and okay. You should save it for someone else," Dorian said, though he was staring at Orym's hands like they were not his. And they might not have been, Dorian didn't remember Orym being able to heal, but that didn't mean he couldn't. It was just surprising. Bear shifting not withstanding.
"When did, um, that happen? The healing. The druid stuff." Dorian winced because 'druid stuff' was not enough to encompass all of that, but it felt vague enough to give Orym an opening. Dorian wouldn't lie, he was curious. Would his Orym suddenly fall into druid stuff? Was it inevitable or a matter of circumstance? He suspected the latter but he never wanted to assume.
"Not that I don't think you make a very handsome bear."
Orym smiled at the thought of being dubbed a handsome bear, his mouth going a bit crooked like it did when he gave his most sincere of amused smiles. He had often wondered what he might have become back home, had he not been placed in this wilderness of a world. Would he have just continued to fight as always? Or did he follow a similar path? Depending on what point in their joined timeline Dorian had come from, he might not even know to clarify for him.
"I'm not always a handsome bear," he said, tone teasing. "Sometimes I'm a cute hare. Or a quick deer. One time I turned into a monkey, but that reminded me too much of Mister, which made me miss Fearne, so—" Orym shrugged a shoulder, face sobering at the thought for a moment. He missed his friends, but he also had one of them right in front of him. It didn't do to dwell on what was still missing.
Instead, he focused back on Dorian's question. "It started not long after I ended up here. I was never much of a druid back in Zephrah, but I could still do little tricks." At that, he let a little ivy creep up his arm, twisting it back and forth as he looked. "My theory is that being here and the magic being so... nature-y? It just kind of amped it up. I still fight like I was trained to, but the magic and changing shape has been handy."
Dorian caught the trail off, the way he could sense that this Orym missed the people who weren't here. It was a familiar feeling that Dorian often felt when they were separated. "I miss Fearne too," Dorian said, in a move of camaraderie. Something they could share together. "But I do like the idea of you being a monkey, or just something small that climbs a lot. I've seen you do some really spectacular things and not wild shape. I imagine it's just an extension of that?"
He took a few steps back and sat down on one of the chairs. It was better to have conversations with Orym when he wasn't chin-to-chest to look at him. This helped, even if he was a little bit further away now. Dorian cleared his throat and awkwardly scooted the chair closer. He probably should have moved it before he sat in it but Dorian was someone who always did something wrong before common sense seemed to kick in. The lute situation being one of those times.
"That makes sense," Dorian said, as if he had been paying attention the whole time—he was, he swore, but the chair was a little off-kilter as he settled into it. "The magic. We don't exactly have treants running around in our Vallo. And the forest is still there but not like this, not so, um—aggressive? Sorry, I know you are feeling really 'one with nature' here but I don't know how you do it. I would be worried every plant would be trying to get me all the time."
There was a pause, before Dorian corrected himself, a little embarrassed. "You probably feel the same way. You live this every day. I shouldn't be, I should be so crass."
Orym took a few steps forward to meet Dorian part of the way as he pulled the chair across the floor, smiling to himself all the while. Though he would never forget Dorian, there were parts of him that had faded to memory, dulling a bit at the edges. Seeing him here, in person and before him, was a balm to Orym's heart that he hadn't known he needed.
No, that wasn't quite true. If the way he still held the sending stone in his hand when he went to sleep at night and kept it on his person during the day meant anything at all, he had known just what seeing Dorian again would mean to him and his heart.
Testing the limits of the chair, Orym perched himself on one of the dainty arms so he could be truly at eye level with Dorian. It felt important as he assured him, "What you shouldn't is feel like you have to censor yourself for me. I know I'm probably different, but I'm still me and you're still Dorian. I always want you to be you around me." That being said and put out there, he pulled a knee to his chest and rested his chin there, thinking a moment before adding, "You're right that it's not the easiest. We worry a lot, because any day the Treants could decide to breach the treeline or a simple scouting mission could turn ugly because of an angry vine."
He smiled at Dorian then, not wanting him to think it was all doom. "It's not an easy life, but it's not impossible, either. We have good times, too. It's just different."
Dorian suddenly became nervous the closer Orym got. The hugging notwithstanding, he realized that as easy as it was to banter with Orym in any world, this wasn't his Orym. And he was shifting into a very strange situation again, the same one Dorian was in with space. And he blushed immediately, furiously, at the thought of kissing Orym. He couldn't do it here, he had promised. But Orym was perched on the chair and so so close and Dorian felt hot. Was it hot in here? It was definitely sweltering in this big, drafty cave system.
"I am always me around me. You. Around you. I'm not censoring, I'm just trying to be respectful, and I know you're going to say I'm being respectful but it's a problem I have put on myself. Because of, because of—" He was losing steam, blabbering in that earnestly honest way that he always did. But now it was because a series of strong urges were overtaking him in this moment. And he couldn't stop his arm from moving, his hand from resting pleasantly on Orym's knee. This was fine. This was totally fine.
He swallowed down a lump in his throat, and nodded. "I'm glad that it's good for you. It should always be good for you. Even if you have to worry about things we don't really worry about back where I'm from. From the Vallo I'm from," Dorian said, feeling a sense of confidence, and he looked—finally—to Orym. His resolve crumbled immediately. The need to protect Orym in the way he protected him was so strong, that he started to lean away, but he could feel the shift of the chair and the imbalance. They would topple if he moved and so Dorian stayed firmly in the tiny bubble of personal space.
"What else—" Dorian started because he thought he was going to do something stupid if he didn't start talking. "What else can you do?"
"Um, well." Orym thought about that, perhaps longer than he might have normally needed, as his attention was caught between the proximity he was to Dorian and the fact that Dorian was touching him at that moment. He had been the one to hop onto the arm of the chair, so the proximity wasn't so much a surprise. The touching, outside of a hug that had been initiated by Orym, though? Casual though it might have been, it was welcome and made Orym wonder.
"Oh, you know," he started, another smile quirking at the corner of his mouth, this time downright bashful. "The magic is the big change. I never thought I'd be able to do that, but now I can talk to plants and call down lightning from the sky, which is—wild. I usually fall back just on fighting when we get into skirmishes, but it's been helpful when we get overwhelmed. I can turn into a bunch of things, but I can't fly just yet. Chet and I run around as wolves a lot, which is fun."
He paused then, shrugging a shoulder. "Outside of that, it's just the normal, boring stuff." Again, demonstrated "normal" and "boring" by letting a plant grow from his palm, this time a blue flower. Reaching out, he tucked it behind Dorian's ear, like he had so many years ago.
Oh no, that wouldn't do. "There is nothing normal or boring about you, Orym," Dorian said, first adamantly and then a little awestruck as he tucked the flower behind his ear. The genuine gesture warmed Dorian's heart, often lost in the same sort of romantic offerings Orym gave him at home. This was why it was so difficult to separate the Oryms that he had come across—they always seemed to be the same, inherently, and Dorian was always so charmed. It was completely unfair.
"And it's good—" His voice was so high, nearly cracking, and Dorian cleared his throat again. He was trying to sound boring and normal. "It's good you have Chet to run around with. He's always going on about how no one understands him, and I sometimes thinks it's because of the wolf inside him. So if you can join him as a wolf too, there's—Gods, I'm talking about Chet a lot." His fingers drifted nonchalantly to the flower, and Dorian sighed. Maybe he should have started off by telling Orym about himself.
Maybe, Dorian should stop being an absolute coward. Tomorrow. "I think I would really like to see you call down lightning. At some point. I mean, not right now because the caves, and I know you said you only use it when you get overwhelmed, and I don't want you to be overwhelmed, that's not what I mean. I just like the idea that you have more in your arsenal. Always learning and growing and it would be nice." Dorian glanced away demurely, he couldn't help it. Especially with his other hand not touching the flower still keeping contact with Orym.
"Just, nice to see. From you. You've been training me at home, you know."
Quite unecessarily, Orym felt a little spark of jealousy alight in his chest at the thought that some other Orym, one that he would never be, got to do something as simple as train Dorian. What was that like, he wondered? Not just the training, but the implications beyond that? Getting to see Dorian whenever he wanted? Being able to draw on recent memories when he was homesick, instead of just moments that had happened literal years ago for Orym, back when they traveled across Tal'Dorei, flew via skyship to Jrusar?
It was fruitless to have such feelings, when he had the opportunity to make new memories with Dorian right now. Still, it was impossible to forget that this time was fleeting. Eventually, Dorian would go home and Orym wouldn't know if he'd see him again.
As these thoughts bounced around in Orym's mind, he did his best to keep his face neutral, to middling success. He wasn't so used to having these sorts of feelings, much less having to hide them. Still, he pushed through and managed, "Have I? I bet you're a good student. You've always been good with a sword, as far as I remember."
Even with all his anxiety, and his worry about doing the right thing, Dorian could sense that Orym was off. Some stray thought, maybe a series of stray thoughts, that pulled him away from the conversation mentally. But that was the only tell Dorian had. What Orym was thinking, what crossed his mind, he couldn't guess. Dorian's brow furrowed, not as unnoticable as he would have liked.
"What just happened right there?" Dorian asked, then he realized he was being rude because Orym was trying to hold a conversation with him about sword training and the other version of him, and Dorian did want to talk about that. Dorian, however, was also used to being able to ask Orym—his Orym— what was on his mind and get an answer. And while maybe this Orym wasn't so forthcoming yet, Dorian still gave into natural tendency to just ask.
"With your face, not that it's not a good face. And any expression you make, you still have a very nice face." Oh, no, was he blushing? While flirting with Orym who was his boyfriend but not his boyfriend here? Why was this happening to him again? "I just meant, where did you go? In here." Dorian reached up to gently touch the side of Orym's head, as if to clarify.
For a moment, it was as though time had come to a stop. It didn't really, of course, but it certainly felt that way as Orym took in a few facts.
First, he was fairly certain that Dorian was just flirting with him, if the blush on his cheeks and the comment itself meant anything at all. That was new, as well as quite welcome. Second, it was clear that Dorian knew Orym well, perhaps even better than he had back in Exandria. Their added shared time in Dorian's Vallo must have given him added insights, if he was able to so accurately read Orym's face—something else, he found, that felt quite welcome.
Last, and perhaps most importantly, Dorian was touching Orym's face.
Orym really did mean to answer Dorian's question with actual words. He knew it was smart to dodge the question, to change the subject by offering him a tour of the caves or challenging him to a sparring match to see what all he'd learned. Instead, mixed together into a perfect storm, his emotions certainly only helping stir everything up, as he glanced once at blue lips and then, with a boldness he only usually had in battle, surged forward to kiss his friend squarely on the mouth just as he had imagined doing a hundred times, hand on Dorian's shoulder to keep himself from falling right off the arm of the chair.
Oh no, not again. Which was, quite certainly not the reaction Dorian should be having to Orym kissing him. In fact, it was the opposite. Because Dorian's usual reaction was something between please, yes, more and oh my gods, Orym is kissing me, how am I so lucky. Dorian was still feeling those things, but wedged in between was this dread of having to explain again to Orym that Orym had kissed him. It wasn't his fault. But Dorian also wasn't doing anything to stop it, and the way Orym kissed, surging into him like he had nothing left to lose, did all sorts of wild things to his stomach.
For the briefest second, Dorian kissed him back. How could he not? It was Orym—Orym who knew him; who understood him; who, despite all the complications between them from the outside world, still kept coming back to him. Dorian's unhelpful mind supplied that it felt a little like fate. No matter how far apart they were, they would always find each other. And kiss, apparently.
He pulled away, or as much as he could pull away with him and Orym pressed so impossibly close. Dorian felt unmoored, shaken, and so so unhappy when he finally said, "I'm sorry Orym. I'm seeing someone else." And that someone else kissed exactly like this one did, so was it really someone else? Dorian, alarmed at his own words, pressed his fingers to his tingling lips, surprised by how new but familiar it all felt.
"I mean, " Dorian tried to correct, feeling like he was lying and not lying at the same time. "I mean it's you. The someone else is you."
In that brief second when he was kissing Dorian and Dorian was kissing him, Orym felt like maybe he could fly now. Was that possible? Having Dorian even be here, albeit from some different mirror world of Vallo, felt impossible in and of itself, so why not? In that moment, he poured all of his longing and pining that he had been trying desperately to keep to himself for years into that kiss, asking questions and answering new ones all at once.
But then Dorian pulled away and Orym's eyes fluttered open and he immediately knew, as his vision focused on the expression Dorian's face was making, that he had fucked up.
"Shit," he said, sputtering out the rare swear from him even as Dorian spoke. Orym tried to hop off the chair to give them added space, but it immediately rocked as his weight moved and he stopped. Face flushed about as red as it had ever been, he continued, "I'm so sorry, I misread the situation, I shouldn't have—"
Except Dorian kept speaking and left Orym a bit speechless. He blinked a few times, mind calculating through what he'd just said. He was in a relationship with another person, but not just any person. He was in a relationship with Orym, his Orym. The Orym that lived in his Vallo. Ignoring the jealousy that made itself known deep within him once more, Orym cleared his throat and said all he really could. "Oh."
Dorian had really messed this one up. He felt himself sputtering, words were now failing to form, when he had just been so good about saying them. Vocalizing his feelings felt impossible. Now Orym was misreading the situation, and Dorian's mouth still felt the phantom pressure of Orym's lips, and he was spiraling. Was he spiraling? He felt on the verge of it, so easy to slip into all the anxieties that were making it impossible to speak.
And yet, Orym looked worse off than he did. And they were both precariously keeping themselves upright as the chair rocked ever so slightly closer to the ground. He tried to speak again, for the both of them. If only to fill the space after Orym's soft oh.
"This is, well. Would you believe me if I said this is not the first time this has happened?" Dorian said, asked, stated for the record. He couldn't bear for Orym to feel wretched over this, and he couldn't bear for Dorian's word fumble—so much for being the Words Guy—to make Orym feel that way. His brain was, indeed, a mess. How did his Orym ever sort through it all?
"We've been doing this for months. Which I think you know? Going in and out of portals trying to get our people back and follow that portal monster, and I've run into you before, in another world, and we kissed then. And then there was a future timeline where you kissed me. And then there was another time where we kissed again, and honestly, I can't stop kissing you, but I also feel so, so—" Dorian made a frustrated little hand gesture, which very nearly sent the chair swaying again. He promptly planted his feet to stop the motion. "I feel like I'm cheating on you, with you, but it's you and I really, really like kissing you."
Orym's expression grew a healthy mix of serious and thoughtful as Dorian spoke, weaving a story of impossibilities—though obviously weren't impossible, as he himself had gone from Exandria to another world and Dorian was sitting there right in front of him. It didn't surprise him, though, that attraction and affection for the genasi transcended space and time. With as long as he knew he'd been nursing feelings for Dorian before he was plucked away from Exandria, he knew that was likely a commonality between all Oryms. How could it not be? Just look at him.
"That sounds like it would be very confusing in your shoes. It also sounds like your Vallo gets up to a lot more than ours does." Then again, he thought, the killer plants and trees provided plenty of excitement without hopping through portals or going to future timelines.
"But I'm sorry I put you in a spot to feel that way," he said, running a distracted hand through his short hair. "I can't tell you what your Orym would say, since I've never met him—" He tried a bashful little smile there, trying to break the tension with some brand of levity. It was a weak attempt, but an attempt nevertheless before he continued, "But I'm not all that shocked that every Orym you've met wants to kiss you. You're pretty spectacular, Dorian Storm."
"So are you, every single one of you that I have met, Orym of the Air Ashari," Dorian said, smiling, then his face fell immediately. "Or is it something else now? You've had a lot of titles lately, and I want to make sure that I was calling you by the right thing, but that—that definitely doesn't matter right now." Dorian waved a hand in front of his face, to just show how unimportant it was. Later, he could deal with this later. He didn't want Orym to worry.
"Let's just, I don't know. Ignore it for a little while. You've clearly wanted to do that for a while and I can't stop thinking about it, and—" Oh, he cut himself off. He needed to stop talking and putting his foot right into his mouth. He kissed Orym then, instead. He had already had a conversation with his Orym, and it wasn't really all that bad. It had even been gently encouraged. Because Orym didn't want himself to be sad, and if this was a little bit of happiness that Dorian could bring—even temporarily—he would. And then maybe a version of him would show up and they would kiss again. Have the reunion this Orym deserved.
The chair rocked again, and he grabbed at Orym's waist for balance. He laughed nervously—whether that was because of the almost-tumble or the fact that he was giving into kissing Orym, it remained to be seen. "Maybe if we're going to continue this, we shouldn't be in this chair. I'm about to take us both out, and I would hate to do it when we're kissing."
Orym had been plenty ready to take his leave. He would have been fine just easing off the chair and trying to forget what it felt like to kiss Dorian, because of course he would have been. He never wanted Dorian to feel uncomfortable; Dorian's well-being and comfort had been a priority for long enough back home that it was second nature, even after so much time had passed. Dorian had been his best friend and that was more than enough.
But then Dorian was kissing him again and damn if that wasn't good.
Just dexterous enough to help even out the balance on the chair with a shift of his weight, Orym couldn't help the wide, happy smile that crossed his face. He took one more kiss, just a quick peck in comparison to the previous two and the others that he hoped they might still get to share, before very carefully getting off of the chair and holding a hand out to Dorian. "C'mon. I know a place."
There were still worries and tasks to complete as Orym's people did their best to help Dorian and the other newcomers. Much of that had to wait until the light of day, though. Until then, they could make the most of the time they had.