Hey everyone, Paradigm of Writing here with a new one-shot of mine called Yesterday. It is the fourth installment in my broken up series of a Smash gone wrong, the first entry being Marth and Ike in Fading, then Lucas and Ness in Oasis, followed after by Lucina and Shulk in Nine Hundred and Thirty Three Days, and now we have Samus and Robin in Yesterday. I absolutely love writing these pieces, and it opens up to a crazy story arc that I truly haven't planned. Many who assumed that my next piece would be about Robin is correct, and I decided to use a cameo from Fading, Miss Samus. We have Samus x (M) Robin. Has this ever been done before? Don't know. Well, I hope you all enjoy!
The lines that make up Robin are another language Samus is only just beginning to grasp. Hieroglyphs etched into the round curve of a bent wrist, the hollowed shadows of collarbones, the set of lips bitten raw.
Samus isn't good with languages.
She's good with words, but that's something different (and as of late, she is beginning to doubt that too, vocabulary deserting her in the face of this new life).
Maybe in the coming of months she'll become conversational in that language, be able to translate the meaning behind the bare slope of Robin's shoulders when he sits in the pale flickering light of motel signs. Too optimistic maybe, but Samus sets her goals high when she can.
Samus finds herself measuring time by the little things she manages to figure out about Samus. She knows that he writes letters on notebook paper. They're addressed to no one in particular- sometimes they'll start off with Lucina in mind but will trail off, become a disjointed ode to passing landscape. A confessional and a distraction. When he's done he'll fold each and every one of those letters into crisp lined shapes. Flowers and animals, every fold careful, precise. Fingers creasing the paper, rhythmic practiced movements; another delicate type of poetry. After, Robin will toss each and every one of them. The road behind them is dotted with sunflowers and cranes made with blue lined notebook paper, Robin's slanted handwriting bleeding through the pages.
Samus knows that when Robin's nightmares get bad (unbearable) she'll pace until her leg is in agonizing pain the next morning, until it's practically useless. Knows that even then, she will try to walk without help, jaw clenched- stubborn. Desperate, half lost to memory of the tournament with that blasted hand, and the blasted boy with the blue hair, the scars it's carved into her mind. ("i'm not sorry," rasps the tiny man in front of Samus, lip chewed bloody and leaning heavily on his crutch. It takes her breath away, anger and something like awe snapping the static into silence in his skull. "I can't be sorry.")
There isn't much she can say he's (Robin, she means silently, slowly, painfully) learned for sure, but... it's something.
She knows that tonight neither of them will sleep.
Neither of them have said anything to the other, but it's written in the in the soft lines of Robin's face where his slender fingers press into her cheek. It's in Samus' fingers too, the way her grip comes and goes over the steering wheel, like a cat kneading its claws.
Robin can't read the lines, doesn't know the words they spell out, but he thinks Samus can hear the words Robin hasn't said, translated everything into the silence they're both fluent in.
Samus isn't good with silence either, but she learnt it years ago. Never dropped it even when it stopped being of use to her. Idly she wonders if that was the first language Robin ever learnt, then she sighs, aggravated and a little shamed.
That was.
A cruel thing to think.
Samus thinks of a little boy with black hair and skinned knees, bright eyes gone honeyed with tears, soundless sobs pouring like mist from familiar bitten lips. It's a memory, not even her own. Lucky the two toddlers found each other, lucky the two cerulean haired gits turned gay and ran for the hills. Happy that Shulk and Lucina discovered pain in the wrong way, and now that there's an extra heterosexual couple to exist. Marth just wouldn't understand.
A hand, pale in the dark of the jeep, touches her own. Dry, cool fingers trace the sore bruises on Samus's knuckles, then the touch slips away. Tries to, anyway. She grabs Robin's wrist, the skin there a little warmer, paper thin. She can feel blood as it courses through blue veins.
"You're holding my hand again," Robin says. Somehow, even though the silence quivers it does not break.
Robin has thin wrists, or, that's what Samus always seems to think- really Samus just has giant paws for hands. Her thumb and middle finger overlap when she grabs his wrist. "I'm not holding your hand, this is your wrist," she corrects him, and this time the silence does break.
He squeezes back, gently and just once, reminds himself that the bones above his fingers won't snap. Samus likes that assurance, it makes the world so much more manageable. He knows that long ago he couldn't do that, not with Lucina. She couldn't cooperate with him, and he wouldn't take the time or money to make it work. Cut off, split off. Things like that worked extremely well.
Samus nods slowly, agreeable even as she rolls her eyes skyward. "Alright." Her hand curls into a loose fist, and Robin turns away from the road to look. The feeling of muscle and tendon and bone all working together for such a simple movement is fascinating, strange. Somehow terrifying. "But why?"
The silence creeps back when he speaks, hesitant like a wary animal. Samus nearly feels guilty when he breaks it again. She knows silence, but he's still learning how to be quiet. He's (Robin, that is) sure she'll never get it, no matter how hard he tries to make it easier for her to. Thinks maybe that's okay.
"Because I want to. Is there a reason you need?" Over the air from the vents, the smooth humming from the road, his voice comes out rough, too loud; unsubtle like a boat horn in the middle of dawn. Samus laughs, remembers Robin jumping like a startled cat when they walked along the harbor in Long Beach a few weeks back, the Queen Mary blasting her horn on the hour.
The lines on Robin's face shift, just a little. He's not frowning, but the expression he has is close. They pass under a streetlight. The lines have shifted again and this time it looks like Samus could be smiling. "I need you to look at the road."
"For what? There aren't any cars."
Samus gestures expansively around them with the hand still gripping onto Robin. The lines shift again, but she can't tell if they go up or down, but she thinks it's fine either way. Robin is lax, following Samus's movements without fuss. Eventually, the car could slow down and the two would sink pieces of themselves away into that precious blue bloodstream, but no one gives much focus on that as it is.
This time there's definitely a smile, pretty and phantomlike in the green glow from the dash.
Watching Robin makes something deep in her chest ache.
"Car crashes aren't in my top ten ways to die."
Robin's fingers tighten, thumb pressed over a calm pulse. He knows, somehow, that that isn't the entire truth. Probably because he feels the same lately. Dying in a car crash isn't the way to he'd want to go either, but comparatively, it's not bad. Not quite fitting, but there is a type of poetry to the thought of meeting their ends in this jeep. He can't deny that. A neat ending to everything. They could've died in a much worse way. Bowser's claws snapping them in half, burning to death from Mario's fire, Peach going crazy over a lost fight that she betted on in an unladylike manner, unfitting for a queen. A car crash seemed considerate.
"I'll bet you're an in your sleep kind of person." Samus says, amused. Their hands have moved to rest near the base of the gear shift.
Robin taps his fingers, tendons moving like slick machinery under her hand. There's a considering hum, then: "No, not really."
"Die standing up?" Samus asks, another bad joke with no punch. She moves the jeep into the next lane, feels the tires move on their axises.
"Of course not." he scoffs. He'd rather die on the toilet like Elvis Presley than standing up. His eyes rise, as he catches the words snagging on the notches of Samus's ribcage. "That didn't turn out so well for you."
There's a beat, Robin can time it by the pulse under his thumb. The cloak of silence is broken again, Samus is laughing and it's a good laugh. Stirs up her insides and makes her sides ache dully. A cough starts up when she tries to take a breath, part smoker's cough and part death rattle, bullet shards in her ribs and tar in her lungs. The grip he has on Robin loosens, and in between stifling his coughs, she is sure he will pull back his hand.
He doesn't.
Just adjusts to hold Samus's hand properly, with palms pressed together and fingers interlocked.
Clearing his throat, she says, "No, m-ah- my bad."
The two glance down at their hands, wonders if there's any meaning behind the way the lines of their fingers weave together.
Thinks, probably nothing grand. Both of them give off a synchronized thought. Not the first time. Certainly not the last time.
It's a good thought.
Silence has been their conversation, but it isn't till the dashboard clock switches to four am that the silence becomes ill fitting over Samus's shoulders, itchy and tight. They are in a town now, or a city. She can never tell which is which. She tells Robin that. Often it came out as a scream.
"You're a writer," Robin says, incredulous. He taps the syllables of 'writ·er' on the back of Samus's hand for emphasis.
"Do you know?" Samus shoots back, raising one expectant eyebrow.
Robin pops his knuckles using her fingers. "I work with code, not grammar. I am a tactician, not an author."
The talking feels better, makes the looming skyscrapers and condos and tall apartments and cozy little lots fall to the back of his mind. Robin hates crowds, Samus has come to be wary of buildings. She thinks it's the cement, or the plaster. Whatever is used to build up all the walls everywhere. Makes the static echo off building sides when it's silent.
Cages her in. (I am free)
It's not a constant thing, so she's grateful for that, can block it out most days. She pulls the jeep into park by a church tucked away in a sleeping neighborhood. They sit for a moment, fingers and palms still pressed together. And then Robin is slipping away, easy without hesitating and she can breathe, gratefulness flooding his veins. She is grateful that, for all Robin's hang ups, he's easy to be with.
When they step out, the air is damp and warm, sends goosebumps crawling up and down their arms, Robin curses, wipes away the fog building up on his new glasses. Oily light from the street lamp casts him in a dirty gold halo, throws the shadows of his face into murky relief, dips the hollow of his throat into shadow. Samus has to look away, has to resettle the line of her own sight on to wrinkles on the back of Robin's shirt, the subtle outline of a delicate spine.
Pretty dove hands lift crooked wire rimmed glasses to the light, the glass catching, shimmering like far away-close stars. The stumps of Robin's fingers itch, a need to immortalize this moment clawing into the wet cave of Samus's chest. Samus slips back on his glasses for the pallid haired male but the itch still prickles at Robin. He tries to calm it by interpreting the new lines. The purse of Samus's mouth means...
"You're standing in the middle of the road."
Robin blinks, leans back to glance at the empty street. The traffic lights flash green, then yellow, crosswalk pinging from 'go' to 'stop'. Back again in the stillness.
"So I am," he replies, too airy. He's still looking at the changing lights, times them with the sluggish beat of his heart. In his peripheral Samus hitches her left shoulder, shrugging, then walks to stand next to him. Fox slanted eyes watching the damp road, the street light still captured in his glasses.
Here, in the new silence, surrounded by buildings and covered in nighttime rain, Samus thinks: "Robin has a traveler's soul. Marth was never like this."
Samus is the one who drives but- It's Robin who takes to the open stretch of road, the expanse of time swallowed by mile markers and radio fuzz, who sinks into the isolation that only traversing along the interstate brings.
"You're thinking something idiotic, again." Robin says. His mouth has an embarrassed pucker to it- almost a pout really. And his eyes are averted, body shifted like he's trying to decide if he wants to bring himself closer or further from Samus's side; weight leaned on his good leg.
Samus tugs at Robin's belt loops, brings him closer. Nearer. There's a huff, muttering under breath, except Robin is moving with the motion of it, allowing. Thrills race up Samus's spinal cord, pooling electric in her joints. "No more than usual, babe." she says, hiding the beginnings of grin in the flattened hair atop Robin's head. He has to hunch down a bit, and just to be an ass (because he's greedy and childish and has the beginnings of what might be heartsickness) rests more weight than Samus can take comfortably. (That's how this (they work) goes, easy and hedging on too much, too little). "You just don't have any faith in me."
Robin groans irritably (fondly), pushes up against Samus, standing on tip toes to get him to let up. Rocks them backwards, and then they're bumping into the jeep. "I believe in what I can see. And all I see is you being an ass, Sammie."
She laughs, crossing her arms over Robin's stomach, lets the sound in her chest rumble through to him. Hopes it resonates in his bones, stays there carving notches out over his ribcage, leave traces of himself inside Robin, tangle up their strings and their words and their languages. "That stupid, that really stupid nickname, dude. What am I, a dog?"
The most obvious thing to say here, of course, is 'You act like it,', but Robin is a good sport. Just makes another hitch-shrug with his shoulders, the lines of the motion smooth, easy for Samus's to translate. Drops down his hands to rest over Samus's, leans forward, just a little, just enough to make the touch tolerable. Distantly they can hear the warble of sirens, far away and close all at once, sound coming and going.
If Robin closes his eyes, if he really focuses.
He can make out snatches from the dispatch.
So he doesn't.
Just leans down with Samus, fitting their backs together snugly.
"Stop that," she says, her voice spinning away in Robin's mind, words nibbled on by static, dark fleshy skeletal fingers.
"I'm," he begins, breath and words (only it's just a word) pressed like mist over the sweet smelling nape of her neck. Loses the string of what he was going to say.
He knows… He knows Samus does not like to be held (down), knows he's pushing his boundaries. But Samus is not good at languages the same way he's not good at finding the line to back off at. But. Samus is (weak) (easy) (safe) (malleable) lovable. He is (weak) (easy) (safe) (malleable) hard to work with.
Samus laughs again, voice box dotted with static and stale smoke; remembers the feeling of their palms together. Thinks-
Wants.
Robin licks his lips. "I'm," He tries again, the reverb of static pooling from him and into Samus. His eyes are probably black, now. Samus's scar must be acting up. "beginning to think your car sickness is contagious, shortstack." The pun falls short as Samus is rather tall.
The road is secular, vast and narrow. No room for things like the divine, no room for the things Shulk liked to write about. Often, Samus thinks the land scape with its peaks and valleys, its alternating terrain, its lines and veins and bloodless sand is what will kill him (the hand, the monster). Or the silence.
Everything that is inherent to Samus, who was born in the desert in the winter in the quiet.
"This is not a pilgrimage," Robin tells himself. That's just silly. This isn't a death march. He's already dead, and. That's fine.
"We don't have to be there until Thursday." Samus says, aloud. For his benefit or her own, it's hard to tell. The lines obscured and the white noise unfocused. "Waiting a while is fine."
"Alright, alright."
Later, they walk, just for a little. An hour, maybe more. Maybe less. Matching up strides, only slightly uneven for Robin's limp and Samus's wide footsteps. Samus is folding a wrinkled receipt she had in her pocket into a crane, fingers smooth lines and creases into the paper. She doesn't need to watch what she's doing, so Robin watches for both of them. Memorizes a new set of hieroglyphs in the tuck of Samus's elbows against his sides, the bunch of denim as she walks, the lock of hair curling behind his ear.
It's a language Robin wants to learn so he can draw- can write out the landscape of themselves. A map or final testament. Leave the finished draft of it on a roadside bench in New York, Texas (a joke, perhaps). Maybe further back where they started in Colorado. A hotel in Minnesota.
"It feels good." Samus says, even later when the make it back to the jeep.
"Yeah," Robin says, trailing his hand along the hood, eyes distant as watches Samus drops her crane to the curb, its white form blackening with mud and oil and refuse. Looks Samus in the eye, glasses crooked, changing the meaning of lines. She is thankful when he doesn't ask for the keys, just slides into his seat. "It does, doesn't it."
I hope you guys enjoyed this piece and are able to put some things together that might've been hard to discern in the last few. Everyone knew Robin would be used, but Samus? I hope this came out of left field for some of you, and thank you all for reading! I don't know, if I decided to do another one-shot like this, who'd I use. My mind is circulating between Link, Peach, Rosalina, Roy, Luigi, and Ryu as some of the characters, maybe doing a Link x Rosalina, Peach x Ryu, and Luigi x Roy but I don't know. Which do you want to see done next? Thanks again guys! Please review and let me know what you thought! Love you all!
~ Paradigm