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 Posted: Mon Sep 22, 2014 10:18 pm
♡♡♥
There was only darkness. This in itself was not concerning. The darkness had always been there. The darkness had guided her to many things over time, all of great significance, all of insurmountable importance. The darkness was home, lit with now-countless pinpricks of someone else's light, the stars that only she knew how to find. She was alone, and this was the first of sensations that was wholly incorrect. There was no one next to her. There were no voices sharing her mind. There were no strings to tangle herself in. And when she tried to move, desperate to return to (what she now knew as) normalcy, she found that she could not; she felt as if six planes of unwelcome existence had been constructed around her, so closely measured that her chest could scarcely rise to sustain her. She couldn't blink, couldn't open her mouth to cry out to anyone who might save her, and even if she had, no one was there. Everything smelled of dirt, sand, rock, and when she found that she was capable of moving her fingers, her attempt to tear at the confinement was met only by dust and filth beneath her nails. Each painful little notch she dug into the world around her was insignificant, pointless, and in the darkness it might as well have not even been there. She might as well--
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Posted: Mon Sep 22, 2014 10:20 pm
She was awake with a start and skipped heartbeat, and she couldn't see, couldn't breathe, and her body was scrambling to rectify this, and she was halfway to shoving his arms entirely off of her, and acknowledging as much only made breathing more difficult.
A dry, panicked sob wrenched its way out of her throat, drawing everything to a halt.
She gasped for air in the wake of it, breath spilling into her lungs in the void it left, lost in the rush of relief that accompanied the influx of oxygen. He stirred beside her, sleep-leaden tone sharing concern with his touch. With urgency, she pulled his arm over her again, owlish eyes awash with terror, peering over the physical comfort of familiar flesh and blood and bone and out into the darkness.
It was not like being trapped if it was by choice. It was not.
It was not.
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Posted: Mon Sep 22, 2014 10:21 pm
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Posted: Mon Sep 22, 2014 10:24 pm
One hour passed with their home devoid of his voice or music or presence, suspended in silence. Laika slept comfortably on a star-patterned pillow within the quiet. Her eyes met her eyes, distant and lost and not yet resigned behind their film of stone.
"This is my life."
Each word was slow, pointed, caustic, deliberate in ways that they might make themselves known.
"You would ruin it. I would ruin yours. This should be irrelevant." And yet. "We both know that you squandered your chance. You were foolish. We are not yet exempt from the danger of mortality. You forgot this. I have not."
She had, on numerous occasions, but fortune favored her point. It was not as if she could disprove her.
"You cannot have my life." She leaned towards her, close enough to see each subtle rise and fall of textured grit within those eyes, not naive enough to believe that they were lifeless. "You cannot. Your efforts are of better use elsewhere. I implore you to restructure what plans you have devised. You would not understand what I have--what I--you would destroy all that exists for me. And of me."
All that had softened over the course of her explanation bore its teeth and claws again, all at once, and she jabbed an accusatory finger against her own stone chest.
"You will always be alone," she spat, through a sneer and narrowed eyes. "But I will not. I will not."
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Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2014 12:48 am
♡♥♥ On the first visit following the mission, Mimsy sat in front of him with the flicker and glow of technology pulsing rhythmically across her glasses, and offered nothing but her presence.
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Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2014 12:48 am
"What does it feel like?"
Her hands were pressed against the pod with all of the restraint of a child transfixed with want, breath colliding against the surface with coils of cloudy condensation. The longer she stayed there, the more difficult seeing him became, until the idea of not breathing anymore felt more reasonable than moving away.
"Do you feel alone?" But she did pull away, eventually, and drew a smile transposed above his face where a smile should be. A Cheshire grin to match the one that she had been practicing.
She was getting very good at it.
"I don't." Though well-intentioned, the statement was a drastic failure at sympathy. "But that is because I have Robert, and our family, and I have you - don't I? Would you say that I do?"
The exhaled puff against the exterior was intentional this time, placed across the center of his chest. She pleasantly dragged her finger through it, a predictable μ, and lifted her finger to enclose it within the border of a painstakingly symmetrical symbol of a heart.
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Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2014 12:49 am
There was tea for two (and there might have been cakes had she not paid a visit to the infirmary beforehand), and the trainee on duty had been so very grateful for her kindness until she walked right past him.
Her teacup was balanced on its saucer in her lap, and his sat cooling on its saucer beside the pod. He had not used any of the sugar cubes she provided for him; perhaps he was feeling well-rested. That was a fair assumption, she thought, even if he had not put forth that information.
"How does it make you feel to know that...well." A faint smile of amusement passed briefly across her lips as she blinked up at him, wide eyes patient and considerate. "Does it worry you, what he does, or do you mind much that he is here?"
She sipped the tea with impeccable manners, and returned it to its place on the saucer before tilting her head at him.
"If you wish that he would go away..." She smiled again, too fond. "I would fix it for you. I would make everything better again."
The cup and saucer were both set aside as she leaned forward, lowering her voice to a conspiratorial whisper.
"But you have to promise to come home."
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Posted: Tue Sep 23, 2014 12:50 am
The ambient noise of the room was soothing enough to coax her into a state of calm, especially after a particularly tiring day of work, and she'd closed her eyes to rest her head against him.
It was not him, and nothing had been since the day that he had not woken up, but it was as close as she could get with layers of disassociation between them. It was as close as she could be when faced with a barrier that effortlessly deflected her own efforts to reach him. It was not quite what they had once had, but it was close.
And she would take what she could, for now.
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