Welcome to Gaia! ::

It had been only hours ago that what seemed like the majority of the island had been called out on a mission. Peyton, for once, had not eagerly volunteered, and had instead, when given the option, opted to stay behind to help make sure things continued to run smoothly on the home front. There were still techs on sight, still meals to be prepared, dishes to clean, rounds to make. Duties did not cease just because there were less people to preform them.

This was what placed Peyton down in the pod room. The dainty Sun was currently slouched back in a tipped chair, feet up on the corner of a desk, with a book propped open on her knee. Periodically her attention jumped from the pages to the monitors, sliding down the long row of pods, then returned to her reading, but it was a quiet afternoon. Thus far.

Until a beeping alerted her to the opening of a pod way, way in the back. The front two feet of her chair smacked back down on the floor, and she was up and out of her seat, moving down the row, before the book she she'd been reading landed on the desktop.

Admittedly, since learning Astrid was here, the elder Creedy had been taking more shifts in the pod room. Ever hopeful, cautiously optomistic, but ultimately draining. Every time she left, and her sister had not woken, had worn at her.

So she had little reason to believe that this time would be different, even if the found of impatient beeping was coming from the stretch of Pods that housed the tiny blonde.

Imagine her surprise as she turned down a row, aiming for a back room, and spotted a petite, blonde haired, hazel-eyed, tan featured girl standing outside a freshly opened pod and looking puzzled. It made Peyton freeze, her own pale eyes going wide, pulse jumping into her throat.

<Screechheart, unfreeze.>

She blinked, drawing in a long breath, and was suddenly rushing forward at an alarming speed to damn near tackle the smaller girl straight off her feet and into familiar arms. "Astrid!" She was here. She was here. Relief and dread swirled in all at once, threatening to suffocate the Sun hunter, but she fought through, hugging her sister to her chest hard enough to make breathing challenging, and felt the first hot press of tears threatening to spill down her cheeks.

By the time Astrid's words had sunk in Peyton had backed the both of them up until the elder's back had hit the front of a pod, and she was sliding to the ground with her sister still held tightly in her arms, dragging the poor girl into her lap whether she wanted to be there or not. She did loosen her grip, minutely.

Unless otherwise filled, the quiet in the pod room was allowed to grow and stretch as Peyton buried her face in her sister's curls and fought to rein in the tear that were now falling fast and furiously. She hated crying, hated it but her shoulder's shook, breath coming in quick gasps. For a full five minutes this would carry on if Astrid allowed it, broken only when Pey lifted her head to look down at her sister's face. "I woke up and you were gone." Her voive was a fragile thing, broken around the edges and rough. "Everything had been a dream. It felt like something ripped you away from me."

Like she'd ripped herself away from her sister over two years ago.

"I came down here, and I found you, and I knew," she had to stop, swallowing past the lump in her throat. "I knew everything we'd talked about had been true. It wasn't real, but it was true." Their father was dead. Astrid had had a terrible last few years before Deus had found her, She'd had to live through the death of their mother, her sister, and their father.

Lilac eyes searched puzzled hazel, and she frowned, brows creased. "You never woke up, baby. Whatever it was we experienced together, that was over a month ago."

Lips pressed into a thin line, Peyton shook her head. "No." They hadn't just put her back in the pod. That would have been easier to deal with, less traumatic. At least, that way, she would have been excepting it, rather than having it thrust upon her on the tail of what she considered one of the worst things she had been forced to endure. Never mind if that mission had not been real the memory of that pain remained, the feel of bone and muscle, crushed. destroyed.

She shook her head again, clearing away the thought, the pain, the weeks of sleepless nights and the helplessness that had plagued her. Finally she had pulled herself out of that rut, and now her sister was here, she was safe. It was reason to be happy, not sad.

A smile, shaky and unsure. She didn't tell Astrid that sometimes candidates died in their pods. That some never woke up, or slept for years. It didn't matter. Might of beens and could haves did not matter, because she was here.

The kiss she pressed to the younger Creedy's temple was abrupt and fierce, but when she drew back that fragile smile had grown. "Welcome to Deus, babygirl. For real this time." Her grip finally loosened, and she lifted a hand to tuck a tussled curl behind one of Astrid's ears. "And this time you get a partner."