See you on the Malibu beach

He'd been bested, yet again. Dread couldn't figure out what the block was, either physically or mentally. Deluge lived rent free in his head... he was grateful for that, actually. Around her, it seemed like the darkness was a little quieter, relenting for a bit. Like some of the bitterness that lived in his chest was soothed. The bitterness. Shit. The more heed he paid to the bitterness, the more it started to overtake him. Coloring fucking everything that he did.

Bitterness, the flames of which had been flamed by Sirius's reaction when he finally spoke about his mother around the man. He could have said something-- anything. Nothing. Bitterness that left everything acrid and singed, ashes in his hands. Dread had tried to swallow his feelings then, but they just kept coming. They kept coming, piling on farther. He's hurting, but when has Dread ever known how to talk about his feelings?

Deluge had told him to find her after the raid. That wasn't a request he was going to deny, even with their precarious relationship. His tracking skills were nothing to sneeze at, and he catches his Raider princess on the breeze. Moving a a long, easy lope, the boy closed the distance between them and coming to rest on a slight rise in the field. "Found you," his words are brassy, his adult voice slowly starting to come in.

"speech"