mental link;

[cognitived]

PRACTICAL if we're gonna win this one, some of us might have to lose it.	RESILIENT do you know what it's like to be unmade?
SKILLED if i miss, it means im just another dude with a bow.	DETERMINED this is monsters and magic and nothing we were ever trained for.

( CODE BY WHAMBAM )

Comments

[cognitived]

[ It is easy, now after so long. An fierce loyalty that curls up beneath the ribs, ebbs at the melded edges of their minds. What they have is nebulous, unvoiced, but it's strong. Strong enough to stand the storm, a whirlwind separating them from the rest of the nest. It gives Sam time to work through his thoughts and his emotions, shoring himself up before sinking back into the collective.

Just the two of them, the connection between them all encompassing. A breath, even as Sam's words spill over -- and god does Clint know exactly how he feels. Something intrinsic and well-worn, and he simply lets his mind curl closer. Yes, they're the same, he knows it well. ]

( Of course. )

[ A murmur, feather-soft and aching. What Sam's asking of him isn't anything new, but Clint knows nothing about that eventual situation will be easy. ]

( You can count on me. )

[sizeofyourbaggage]

[ Thank you doesn't really even begin to cover Sam's gratitude. Not just for this, for the promise that Clint's making him that they both know won't be easy to keep, but for everything.

For the loyalty that settles between both of them, nestled so deep that Sam can't begin to tease out what part is his loyalty to Clint and what part is Clint's to him - and what does it matter, really, when it's all the same?

You can count on me, Clint's mind murmurs to him, and that - that's one of the few things that Sam's known since before they got here, that hasn't changed. That's only grown, really, because right about now Sam's trust in Clint is absolute. How could it be otherwise, when their minds twine together in understanding over one of the greatest fears that Sam has, when he can feel Clint's breath with every one of his?

The distance between them grows to be too much, and it presses on him - the urge to be physically with him as they are mentally.

Where are you forms in his mind, but before he can complete the thought, there's an echo of anger in Sam's mind - not his own, feedback from someone else. Sam's mind shifts, and he pulls away. Well - as much as he ever pulls away from Clint, which mostly means that he leaves an impression - meet you at the ship in a bit before refocusing his attention on the presence of someone physically entering the room. ]

[cognitived]

[ No, no it won't be easy. They both know it, they both know what it'll demand of them. But they both also know Clint will never hesitate.

Instead, Sam sighs with weary relief, sinking further into the yielding grasp of Clint's mind. Loyalty and a fierce resolution, and it's hard to parse, to figure one's loyalty from the other. But it doesn't really matter, does it? Not in the face of this understanding, in the shapee of the creature they've forged beneath their ribcages, in the same sip of air in dual lungs. Reassurance, and when Sam reaches forward Clint reaches back, reading the forming of thought as if it's his own.

The anger catches at his mind too, a slip-slide little thing that's gone before he can catch it between fingertips. Purposeful, he knows, feedback but brushed back by Sam's careful hands. Not his to see, to know, and so he subsides, curiosity roused but ignored for now.

Later, and he acknowledges it. Slips further from Sam's mind with a little nudge of shoulder to shoulder, fond fond fond. An impression of his own ebbs at the space between minds where they are becoming both and neither. I'll be there, and he will. Slipping through hallways with ease, to settle in their ship for a wait. ]