After the mission debriefing was over, Clerise had staggered to her bedroom.

Well.

Technically, to Clarice's bedroom. She was just...borrowing it until her proper one was fixed.

{[ Interesting, ]} Balthazar offered, mentally probing at her thoughts on the blonde woman. {[ A new development? ]}

"You're different," is all she replied with, not wanting to talk about that area of her feelings. Talking about them made them...real. Clerise fumbled with the keys, going for the least familiar one on her keyring.

{[ Am I? ]}

Clerise tugged the door shut behind her. She had removed her boots down on the field. They were in one hand, coat thrown over that arm. Her other hand held both of Balthazar's new form: two razor sharp sickles.

"Yeah. You haven't called me useless even once," the redhead pointed out, dumping her dirty things on the bathroom tile, promising to herself (and to Clarice) that she'd clean the mess up soon enough.

Besides, Clerise was pretty sure that the Life Assistant would understand.

Standing in the bathroom, Clerise hummed to herself momentarily. She set the sickles down on the rim of the tub, right in front of her, the exhausted trainee worked on divesting herself of the clothing that was so cold and gross and clammy. She threw each article of clothing onto the ground with a grunt, stretching

She never claimed to be a classy lady.

Balthazar was quiet and pensive, and Clerise felt him do the mental equivalent of shielding his eyes. She laughed, then. "Well. Maybe you haven't changed THAT much."

Clerise felt a surge of emotions that were clawing their way out of her belly, up into an awful lump in her throat. She huddled in a fluffy towel, feeling suddenly small and vulnerable. "I missed you," she mumbled, quivering like a leaf.

Not unkindly, Balthazar replied with a simple {[ Oh, Clerise. I know. ]}

After grabbing Balthazar again, she slowly made her way towards the bedroom, frowning all the while.

"Do not," she replied, petulant, flopping down onto her favourite thing in all of Clarice's dorm, save for perhaps the woman herself: the bed.

{[ Beg to differ, love. I wasn't sleeping that whole time, you know. ]}

Clerise slid into the covers, rolling herself in them, relishing in the softness of the sheets and the squishy nature of the pillows. "You weren't?"

{[ The first few hours or so, perhaps. Since then? I've been awake. Blind, but. Your thoughts would often come in, loud and clear. ]} His tone was almost uncharacteristically gentle. Before, Clerise remembered Balthazar as a nag and someone who was often cruel to her. He himself had often thought her to be a burden.

Things were different, now.

"Oh." Clerise shivered, toes curling a little.

{[ You are a conundrum, Clerise Nicole Wilson. More so than I originally thought. ]}

The redhead just shrugged a little, wordless.

{[ I spent a great deal of time being cramped, in your head, and I grew to resent it. You think of everything and nothing all at once, at a thousand miles a minute. You think without thinking, with vivid images and shifting shapes filled with colours, all in perpetual motion. There was no room for me at all, I knew that from the get go. ]}

She could feel his smile; small and wry, but there, warm and almost affectionate, like summer sun filtering in through pale curtains.

It felt right. Warm and like...Like home.

{[ And then you were lost. And there went the busy train I was used to, full of jostled elbows and too much stimulation. It drifted downwards into despair-- and I had to blindly listen as your thoughts took a turn for the worst. ]} Balthazar sounded truly discomforted by this fact.

"It was a bad, bad time," Clerise confirmed, the words as quiet as a sigh. "I thought I was going to die. I said my final goodbyes."

{[ I know. ]}

"And then Clarice told me you were okay, just that you were...sleeping. Dormant. I was...I was so relieved. That we were going to be okay."

{[ Her description is accurate enough. My consciousness often drifted, a lost ship at sea. Strong emotions, though, would jolt me awake. Like...today. ]}

Clerise laughed, a little. "I was gonna ask how you knew I needed saving, but I guess that answers...that." She still felt awful from the mission: too cold, leaden limbed and so sore. There were a few bruises from ice chunks colouring her pale, freckled skin, and a laceration or two.

{[ During all my years at see, I fell overboard only once, ]} Balthazar said, voice oddly grim. {[ It was the event that led to my demise. A group of hunters capsized our boat. I nearly drowned, until one of them pulled me out-- I recognised the thought patterns. The struggle, the inevitable defeat. I was not about to let such a thing take me twice. ]} He didn't have to say it for Clerise to know it: there was an 'or you' tacked on to the end of that.

His voice was strong, and how had she forgotten it? Silky and low, gravely when he got upset. A touch protective of her, in his own way.

"You remind me of my dad," Clerise murmured, her voice half hazy with sleep.

{[ I will take that for a compliment, sheila. ]} His voice was soft, soothing.

"You should." It was petulant, and final. Her father had been a good man. Kind and just too, too patient.

Recognising her exhausting, Balthazar withdrew a little from Clerise's mind. {[ Get some sleep, Red. ]} He stayed...Close. Closer than he usually did, a warm presence falling over her mind like a protective blanket.

{[ I'll be here. ]}