[ Mizael moves in and grabs at his wrist and Vector can only stare down at that hand on his arm, can only sneer faintly at the the pale weakness of those human fingers.

And then Mizael is moving away and Vector is...

(disappointed?)

(no - better to be alone to have Mizael's stinking human flesh smearing its filth and its stench across even his Barian shell)

He only watches, for a few moments. Stands there, still - the kind of stillness that tells of a storm to come - and watches, head tilting just a little to listen to Mizael's words. And then all at once he's whirling himself about again, his wings buzzing up behind him like some kind of hellish beetle's carapace. ]

I'm here? Yes.

Yes, I am.

But you? Or Alit?

He was silent too. Not even an echo.

[ Alit, whose star burns the very brightest among those of their constellation.

Alit, who burns so bright that Vector has always wanted to shade his eyes lest he be blinded.

And he'd been silent. As silent and dark as if he were dead; as silent and dark as he'd ever been after Vector's attack.

(for perhaps the first time in his life, Vector feels some little tug in his core of...?)

(--no)

(not that; never that)

(Vector cannot regret, cannot feel remorse; because to allow an emotion like that is to allow a crack to form, and to allow even the slightest weakness is to invite death, to invite oblivion)

(Vector does not fear, but if he did then he would fear oblivion) ]

How do I know you're really here? In front of me?

That you're not - and he wasn't - just in here?

[ He taps sharply at his head, and he stares at Mizael with wild eyes, and he knows deep down in his core that he's playing too much of his hand but--

(Mizael is silent and so was Alit, and so Vector is left alone with only the noises he can make inside his own mind)

(he does not fear anything, and so he's not afraid)

(but if he did, perhaps--) ]