Welcome to Gaia! ::

CW: eating disorders and body image issues.



Getting some space to himself felt like a huge ask for Ilmari, these days. He knew that he wasn’t helping himself by actually falling in line with the unofficial rule that his parents had started trying to make A Whole ******** Thing, about him not going anywhere without somebody else to follow and presumably babysit him. But as much as he resented the unofficial new rule—as much as he knew, despite his parents refusing to outright say that they were trying to meddle in and/or interfere with his diet—the threat of disappointing them loomed large over everything, motivating Ilmari to at least play nicely with his parents’ collective insanity some of the time.

But other times, he needed to follow Queen Ari’s example and break free.

Other times, he needed to bestow affection on Lord Darlington, make sure that she was all set with her favorite toys, the little steps she used to get into his bed, and a full water dish, and then saunter out the front door without telling either Jayce or Gilbert where he planned on going. If he needed to defend himself later—well, his parents had not, as far as Ilmari knew, asked either of his housemates to actually keep an eye on him or anything like that. And anyway, all three of them in the house had duties to the Negaverse, so going out on a patrol only made sense. It was fine. Ilmari was almost twenty-two, a perfectly stable adult who could make his own choices and take care of himself just fine, thank you.

Frankly, he had proven that with the fact that he’d managed to avoid gaining back any weight that mattered while his parents tried so hard to wreck his diet for him. That thought alone was enough to put some serious confidence in Ilmari’s stride as he hit the town, all powered up and ready to go, bounding up fire escapes so he could traverse the city’s roofs. Why shouldn’t he move with confidence? He had the willpower, self-control, and sluttaciously snatched little waistline to back it up. Maybe the rest of his life was always slipping through his fingers at one speed or another, and maybe the need for perfection ached inside him that much more when he thought about the absolute ******** going on with his team.

Maybe it wasn’t his responsibility to fix any of them, or to fix their problems, or any of that. Everyone else on the team was older and more experienced than he was. Even Litharge, who had less experience as a Negaverse officer, had several preceding years of experience from his time as a Mars Knight. While he’d been doing that, Baz had still been in school at Romano’s, desperately trying to break himself out of being a chubby, awkward little duckling so he could be a perfect swan, the way he wanted. Supporting the team as much as he could didn’t mean that Ilmari needed to fix them.

But it did give him the important task of keeping the team’s best foot forward for the rest of the Negaverse as much as he could. Whatever it took to keep anyone else from thinking that anything was broken while they tried to sort things out themselves.

Hence, the need for draining as much energy as he’d gotten in the habit of doing—and the annual Star Festival provided so many opportunities for Ilmari to do that. Tonight, he found one in the rainbow meteor showers that visited the city this time of year. Perching atop the roof of the public restroom in North End Park, Ilmari didn’t look for cover or anything; being quiet felt like he was doing enough. Civilians had gathered to watch the colorful display, and while Ilmari tried to be prudent about not draining too much from any one person, he did still pull energy from the normies two at a time. He could do that, after all, and the Negaverse needed energy, so literally why not use his abilities properly?

As soon as Ilmari felt the oncoming Order aura, he considered leaving. He didn’t make a move toward that, though. Why should he have? He’d gotten here first and he was more powerful than they were. Strategic retreat had its purpose when a situation grew too dire, but one little basic senshi or newbie Knight was nothing to worry about. Ilmari only needed to focus on his purpose here, and on doing right by the Negaverse by doing his job and doing it well.

That the other senshi proved bold enough to jump up on the roof with him was annoying—but also quickly explained by the horns, tail, and patches of scales that marked him as a space senshi. Clearly not one like Tianyi, if he felt the need to come throw around accusations against a stranger like that (Tianyi did that just the same sometimes, but it was cute and acceptable when he did it actually, which was definitely a function of him being so tiny and dainty—unlike the Taller Than Ilmari senshi who stood before him now—and definitely no other messy and likely impossible to resolve feelings on Ilmari’s part). But thinking about the space senshi whom Ilmari actually enjoyed dealing with wouldn’t help him any right this second.

“Not unless you’re looking to make it for me,” Ilmari huffed back at the other senshi, crossing his arms and shaking out his hair. “I’m just doing my job, same as all of you say about bothering the senshi like me.”