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 Posted: Wed Jul 23, 2014 10:51 pm
The Night Before
He'd woken up once, in the middle of the night, to find that it was not early morning yet and that he could go back to sleep. But he hadn't, at least not immediately, because the dream that had woken him up in the first place was still fresh in his mind; nothing concrete, but emotions, thick and confusing and twisting and black were all still there, fraying his thoughts.
He was lying on his back in Stormy's bed, and she was next to him, curled up on her side like she usually was, though she was facing away from him. Gale remembered falling asleep with one arm wrapped around her waist from behind, his face pressed into the back of her neck, but he'd shifted a little in his sleep, and now he was a few inches away, his legs tangled in the sweatpants he wore. Clearly when he'd turned, his clothes had not turned with him, because his shirt was twisted as well, the neckline of it digging painfully at the side of his already bruised neck. Gale yanked at it, pulling at his shirt in irritation until it was properly in place again, and then he sighed, lifting a hand to run his fingers through his hair.
He looked at the clock - Three oh three it read, the numbers too bright in the darkness of the room that was lit only by the faint rays of moonlight drifting lazily in through the blinds over the window. Gale turned his head to look at Stormy; she seemed so small when she slept - he could see clearly just how thin she was now. Gale rolled back onto his side and curved his arm back around Stormy, settling his chin on her slender shoulder to look at her face. Her eyes were closed, her breathing deep and even, but every once in a while her expression would flicker, a flinch passing across, as though her dreams were not pleasant, and that she was thinking about things much more painful than the quiet reassurances of her poetry and music.
Tomorrow would not bring that reassurance.
Gale let his fingers drift absently up and down Stormy's arm, smoothing down the sleeve of her sweatshirt, and then, after a moment, he let himself touch her cheek, trailing the backs of his fingers along her face briefly. He wanted to tell her not to go, to just stay here with him, but it was a foolish, selfish request, not to mention an unreasonable one. They couldn't just back out of missions because they wanted to - what would be the point of Deus, after all, if everyone decided to opt out of missions because they were too dangerous?
It was a stupid thought. Gale sighed a little and moved his arm back to Stormy's waist, the side of his cheek against the back of her neck. In just a few more hours they would be waking up - at least Stormy would be, and she would hopefully wake him to tell him goodbye, but maybe she would let him sleep. Maybe she would prefer to let his memories be of her gentle voice in his ear, rather than the sad, worried one she was bound to take before she left.
His eyes fluttered shut. He didn't want to think about it. Gale exhaled a breath, and tried to go back to sleep.
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Posted: Thu Jul 31, 2014 8:28 am
The Morning Of
He didn't remember falling back asleep, but at some point he must have, because the next thing he knew he could hear gentle footsteps moving around the room. Gale blinked blearily with heavily sleep lidded eyes and saw her at the dresser, pulling things out and putting them into her bag. He watched her silently, still wrapped in that cocoon of blankets and dazed with tiredness, letting himself feast his eyes on her as though trying to memorize the imprint of her image in his head. Even with her lack of hair and her almost dangerously thin, waif-ish appearance, she was still beautiful to him, and she would always be beautiful for him. Maybe it was the rose-tinted glasses he tended to wear around her, but regardless, he didn't want her to see that he was awake just yet.
About fifteen minutes later, she had gotten everything almost ready to go, and as she stepped over to the bed to wake him, Gale smiled sleepily up at her, his hair falling in messy slashes over his forehead. She whispered all of the things that he wanted to hear and didn't want to hear, about how she would see him again and that she would be okay and little comments about what to do while she was gone. Gale lifted a hand as she spoke, touching his fingers to the side of her face and letting them rest there, wanting to feel her, wanting to remember her warmth, because even if it wasn't a permanent goodbye, it felt horribly far because of the destination and the lack of an end date. He couldn't stop the nerves or the anxiety or the fear, but he wasn't going to be melodramatic about it either; he needed to be strong for her, to show her that he would still be here when she returned.
Her voice was gentle. He drew her down for a kiss, sliding his hand gently around to the back of her neck to keep her in place and then tenderly brushing his fingers over her cheek and her jaw and her collarbone, little flitting touches, desperate for more, always wanting her to be close to him so that he would not have to be so terrified that she would not come back.
"Be safe," he told her, "I love you," and kissed her again, gently, quietly, softly, and then she was gone, and he was alone.
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Posted: Fri Aug 01, 2014 2:47 pm
The Second Day
The Death Division meeting had been, of course, both highly illuminating and irritating all the same, mostly because he'd once again been subjected to Caelius' never ending disapproval. Gale let himself into Stormy's room and set his bag down on the floor beside the desk before flopping down onto the bed, pushing his face into the pillows. It still smelled like her; her presence seemed to overwhelm him, even in her absence, and he rolled onto his side, gathering the pillows in his arms and exhaling a long, tired breath. It had only been two days since she had left, but he felt the loss acutely, most notably because he couldn't even contact her while she was away. The mission was, of course, a dangerous one, in the Sahara of all places to have to go, and it was this that was causing Gale the most anxiety.
The Sahara changed people, and never for the better.
He lay there for a few moments, debating on whether to take a nap, but eventually sat back up, pushing a hand through his hair. Gale untied his shoes, set them neatly beside the bed, and then padded in his socks over to a small carrier that was at the foot of the bed, on the floor. He knelt beside it and turned it to face him, squinting into the darkness. Jewel-bright eyes, a shining blue that was visible even in the darker shadows, peered back at him, curious and questioning.
"Hey, Tink," he said, and unlatched the door to the carrier, reaching inside and pulling the little minipet out to set on his knees. It wasn't very big - none of them were - but this one had reminded him of Jinhai somehow. She was roughly the same size as a small dog, with leathery wings that extended out about a foot on either side of her slim body. A tail stretched out, snakelike, behind her, and she gave him a look that clearly suggested she was unhappy being kept in a cage.
"I know," he told her, and patted the top of her scaly head. "Not much I can do about that, I'm afraid. It's toxic here, you'd melt in about a second."
He felt a little silly, talking to a minipet, but Tink had brought him a strange sense of comfort to help ease the loneliness left behind in Stormy's absence. She twisted around in his lap and climbed up his torso, tiny claws digging into his shirtfront and making him wince a little. Finally she settled onto his shoulder and part of his neck, her head against his hair, the way a cat might curl up with its owners.
"What should we do today, Tink?" Gale asked, not that she could answer, and he made his way towards Stormy's desk, pulling out the chair and taking a seat at it. There was already a pad of sticky notes (bright pink ones in the shape of daisies, not the boring yellow kind), as well as a few Sharpies that he'd gotten from a trip through the portals. Gale had been scribbling little smiley faces and notes of affection and encouragement since Stormy had left, writing a few words and then sticking them in places he thought she might find them later - Hi, pretty lady was currently stuck to the underside of her desk; Sweets for the sweet was pressed against the headboard of the bed; some hearts and a smiley face were in the closet, and I love you was on the window, where it could be seen bright and cheerful against the pane of glass. He fully intended to make good use of the sticky notes, and by the time Stormy would return, he wanted to have them all over the place, so that even months later she would still be finding them.
But now, it was work time, and Gale reluctantly pulled the file out of his bag and set it on his desk. He wanted to go over the information regarding the Horseman lairs; it would need much more research before he could hope to infiltrate them successfully, since he wasn't allowed to use the Horseman golems just yet (damn Caelius). There would also need to be a recruitment to find people willing to come along with him; he'd gotten one assigned to him automatically, that Bradley person that was unfamiliar to Gale, but he would need to find others to take along as well.
"Pen, pen," Gale muttered to himself, as he rifled through a few things on Stormy's desk. The Sharpies were in abundance, but he wasn't about to jot notes down using a permanent marker, especially not on official forms. He opened the top drawer and browsed around, and when he found nothing, he pulled open the second drawer, lifting up a few notebooks to see if there were pens underneath.
No pens, Gale soon discovered, but there was a pack of cigarettes.
His hand froze where it was, holding the notebooks up, and then, slowly, he reached beneath them with his free hand, his fingers closing around the small box as he pulled it out, absently sliding the desk drawer shut behind him. It was a slender box of menthols, open, with one missing, but for the most part it seemed relatively untouched. Gale turned it over in his hands, his eyes tracing the letters and the shape of it. His stomach gave a twist, something akin to sadness or maybe anxiety or maybe something else entirely as he stared at the box of cigarettes, his expression quite unreadable.
Tink gave a soft, growling mewl, and poked her head against his cheek, which succeeded in knocking him out of his inner reverie. With a small sigh, Gale opened the desk drawer again and carefully stuck the cigarettes back where he had found them, tucked beneath the notebooks. He took a steadying breath and closed his eyes for a moment, trying to get back into the right state of mind to be working.
"Okay," he said, after a moment, half to himself, but half to Tink as well. "Okay. Time to work."
He bent over the desk and began to read, and it wasn't until a few moments later that Gale realized he still hadn't found a pen.
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