trans_9 | [closed; backdated to just after podpops]

There were two beds in the small space, one rumpled and one untouched, so Presea took a seat on the made bed and looked around curiously. There was a certain distracted feeling to the room, or so she imagined, rather like his office, where his filing system was a sort of hopeful mess, no matter how much he insisted otherwise. The thought made her smile a little.

"Thank you," she said. The omnicomm was a sudden remembered weight in her pocket. She drew it out and put it in her lap, somehow unwilling to press the keys just yet. How could something this strangely innocuous contain information that worried Clef so much?

Clef self-consciously pulled the sheet on his bed up into a slightly more organized-looking position, as though Presea had not totally already seen it by that point.

"We could put up a partition," he offered, skillfully avoiding the issue at hand.

She blinked in surprise, although the distraction was honestly welcome. A partition seemed like more trouble than it was worth to her, however. Given, it had been a very long time since she'd shared quarters with anyone, but the ship was huge. It wasn't as if they'd be crammed in here for hours every day. There was room to share. If that's what he wanted to do, and he seemed to be offering. The idea was a little thrilling to her, really. Best friend or no, her fondness for him went a bit deeper. She wouldn't mind spending a lot of time with him.

Oh, but maybe he'd offered for the sake of his own privacy! He was even less used to sharing than she was, she imagined. And he was always to be a proper gentleman.

(Yep. Great distraction tactic.)

"If you'd like one," she said, a bit cautiously. "I don't mind either way."

"I don't really mind, either," he replied, looking away to hide a smile. "So long as you wouldn't be offended."

This was being the least productive conversation ever, but also the best one.

Offended? What an old-fashioned attitude. She hid a smile of her own.

"I promise I won't watch you dress," she said, daringly.

"You'll pretend not to, I'm sure," he returned, somehow maintaining his prim and proper facade despite the smirk on his face.

"I wouldn't want to damage your reputation," she said sweetly, shifting her position to cross one leg atop the other. Doing so forced her to pick up the device again, and this time she rested her hand on it lightly. She knew full and well they were just delaying some kind of unfortunate inevitability, but she wasn't going to mention it.

"It can be our little secret," he replied, removing his shoes to settle into a kneeling position on the bed. She shifted positions at the same time, and in the nervous shuffle he finally acknowledged the omnicomm.

"We're doing a very good job of not discussing the matter we came here to talk about," he said, looking up at her with an amused smile but also a hint of sadness. She didn't want to find out about Cephiro being gone, and - he realized - he didn't want her to. This was going to hurt both of them.

Presea nodded after a moment, biting her lip a little at his pained expression. He was right. Waiting wasn't going to solve the problem. She needed to woman up and face the facts, whatever they might be.

The room might be small, but she felt like he was a million miles away sitting there across the room from her. Still, she took a deep breath and thumbed the machine on clumsily, trying to remember what she'd been told about navigating the device. The blood thundered in her ears as she read; if he had said anything, she wouldn't have heard it.

She'd only gotten a little bit into it when the dry writing startled her: Supposedly, the reason we're here is we were saved by this ship's former crew when our worlds were destroyed. She glanced up at him in horror, and then back down at the device, reading it again. The words hadn't changed.

"It can't--" she started, and her voice cracked, a lump rising in her throat. "This can't be true."

Her look was a little desperate now. She stared at him as if she expected him to have some kind of answer, some kind of way to soften the blow. Even when times were terrible on Cephiro, there'd always been some alternative, and he'd usually been the one to come up with it.

Surely he knew something like that. Surely.

She was staring at him, giving him that look he knew so well, and all he could do was stare back and try to sink into the mattress a little until he couldn't take it anymore.

"Supposedly," he said quietly, looking away to avoid seeing the expression on her face when she realized he had failed her, "Our memories of the events leading up to our being here have been repressed, and we can recover them by asking Stacy."

Well, that wasn't what she had hoped for. Not at all. And she wasn't blaming him, couldn't hate him for telling her the truth, because that was what she'd asked for. She curled her hands into fists, pressing them against her thighs and biting her lip so hard it started bleeding. She looked away from him, not angry but because she really didn't want him to see her cry.

A partition would have solved that, she thought wildly, and almost laughed before she did start crying in earnest, making small sad sounds she couldn't quite repress. She covered her face with her hands.

After a moment he got up and padded over to hesitantly embrace her. He had never seen her cry before - not as an adult, at least - and it seemed like the right thing to do. She seemed like she needed to know that he was there. Even if he couldn't do anything else, he could be there for her.

"I'm sorry, Pharle."

Suddenly, he was crying, too - big, silent sobs that shook his entire body as he buried his face in her shoulder. He didn't quite know why. Something about them being perhaps the last remnants of Cephiro - in quite a literal sense, all they had was each other. He never wanted to let go ever again.

He shouldn't call her Pharle anymore, she almost said. There wasn't anywhere for her to be Pharle of. But instead of saying it, she wrapped her arms around him and pulled, encouraging him to join her on the bed. They could both use the comfort. He wasn't done mourning, either, and she would have been surprised if he was.

She let the tears come, her grip so strong on him that she might be hurting him unintentionally. Presea had a certain philosophy when it came to crying. She hardly ever though it worthwhile unless there simply wasn't anything else to do. She'd been more free with her tears as a child, when injured or upset, but her general personality meant that she was generally quite productive, even when sad. As long as there was some path to take. But there was nothing to bring a destroyed world back, and although helping other worlds was a great goal and she wanted to be part of that, nothing would bring back Cephiro. Sure, the brochure said there was a chance, but for once, she couldn't be optimistic.

So here she was, sobbing like she hadn't since she'd fallen from a tree in childhood and broken her leg. Gasping, ugly crying, the occasional small wail, and nothing to anchor her except Clef's small weight next to her.

She lost herself for a while, there in the dark places.

He let himself be pulled in with a squeak in a slow and half-controlled climb that ended in him straddling awkwardly between her lap and the bed. She had his chest pressed hard against hers and he thought her nails might be digging into him somewhere, but none of that mattered.

"Presea--" he whispered, his cheek against her neck, but he never got farther than that before he dissolved back into sobbing. Not that he knew what he could possibly say right now, anyway, but he kept saying it over and over. Somehow it made him feel better, in an 'I'm going to cry even harder' kind of way.

Her name. This was better, somehow. She was here, he was here. Presea and Clef. They were the only people that needed to exist for the moment. She didn't respond with words to his calling, instead just holding him as closely as she could in their awkward positions. She didn't want to shift too much in case he thought she wanted space now. Let her foot fall asleep. It would matter later.

He needed this as much as she did. Perhaps more. Clef hadn't seen her cry since she was a girl, but she'd never seen him do it at all. She had a feeling that it was generally something he did in private.

Her own crying settled a bit, lessening from the hard, angry sobbing that she had been doing at first. That simply wasn't sustainable, even if she cried her voice hoarse. Now she was gulping on occasion, the tears still streaming, sucking at the air miserably.

Their world was dead. As far as they knew, they were the last members of their species left. The last people to share a lot of things, in fact: the common language. The way a blooming flower smelled in spring. The rustling through the trees of the Forest of Silence. She could sit down and write a book, and still never capture the beauty of her country. And if she could write one, Clef could probably write a dozen. He had done the Pillar's job when the princess was unavailable, and he had held them all together when all seemed lost. Now it was, and the ship, as magnificent as it was, could only be a poor substitute for their losses. So many faces, gone or hidden in the pods. They would have to be there, her friends. She couldn't believe otherwise.

But maybe she was crying for them too, in case they weren't. She unclenched the fingers of one hand, painfully, and used it to cup the back of Clef's head against her chest, gentle.

He hid his face and made a small sound as if in acknowledgement of the gentle touch. It made him feel vulnerable and fragile - like an actual person - which made the pain that much more acute. The tears came at intervals - every time he thought he was going to stop, for real this time, he'd say something or have some random thought and it would start all over again. Like he had been holding it back for so long that now he just couldn't stop, and his composure was so lost by this point that he didn't think he'd ever get it back.

"Don't ever let go."

"I won't," she soothed, and she held him as her own tears began to slow and dry. She felt shaky, like she'd just run through the entire Forest, monster in hot pursuit. But better, too. Which seemed almost ridiculous, really, but now she had something to do rather than cry. She had Clef to support, and even if this was a different way of support than she had given him before, she still felt herself capable. And willing, too. She hummed a little, tunelessly and not joyfully, but in a hopefully calming manner. She was here. She was alive. And now it was time to do something with that fact, even a small thing like comforting someone else.

"I'm here," she said quietly, hand still tangled in his hair. The other one pressed reassuringly into the small of his back.

This wasn't at all how he had intended for this to go. In fact, this was sort of the reverse of what he had been aiming for. Oh, well.

He relaxed a little and opened his eyes, the bouts of crying having lessened in duration and intensity. Still, he didn't want to pull away, instead lifting a hand to affectionately brush her neck.

She shut her eyes a moment and leaned into the touch, drinking in his affection. They'd never been this close before, at least not physically. It was intimate in a way deeper than simple nakedness. She liked it a lot. (To be honest, she'd dreamed of it more than once.)

She smiled at him a little. "Thank you," she said. "I needed that."

He looked back up at her, not smiling but apparently done crying.

"We both did," came the reply as he caressed her some more. "Thank you."

"Have you ever talked to anyone about it?" she said, almost scolding. "You can't keep everything inside, you know. You'll burst."

She put her hand on his chest, over his heart. "I don't think either of us want that," she continued firmly.

The attack had been sudden, and in their shared vulnerability and intimacy he had been completely unprepared. All he could do was blink at her, wide-eyed.

There were absolutely no right answers here. The best he could probably manage would be to stutter around awkwardly before saying something like, 'erm, well, not as such...' and that would just be embarrassing. Better to just keep his mouth shut and shake his head: No, I have not said anything; no, I do not want to explode.

"Well, now you've got someone to talk to," she said firmly, her gaze softening. "Even if it does make us a mess. I'm not a head doctor, really, but I'll listen. I promise."

And before she could talk herself out of it, she leaned forward and kissed his cheek gently, as if in emphasis.

Clef could feel his cheeks turning red, but he leaned in and kissed her as well.

"The same goes for you," he said, taking her hands and squeezing them a little. Not that she really had that problem, but he felt entitled to tease a little anyway.

"I'm not the one who stores up feelings like gophersquirrels store up nuts," she said, lobbing the ball right back into his court. She could feel his kiss on her cheek like a pleasant burn.

"I reserve the right to maintain a certain amount of dignity," he said, attempting to regain his composure. She could totally stop now, as far as he was concerned. He was sufficiently embarrassed.

"Oh, dignity," she said. "I suppose. Do you want me to let you up?" She was reluctant to ask, but maybe this was part and parcel to the dignity thing.

"That's alright," he replied, glad that she got the hint. "This is enough dignity for now."

"Oh, good," she said, fingers teasing at the back of his neck. She was quiet for a moment, and then she continued, "I'm glad you advised me to wait to read it. I don't think that bursting into tears would have left a good impression on the rest of the crew."

"Eheh. Well, as usual, experience has taught me well."

"Oh!" she said, her brow furrowing. Somehow it hadn't quite occurred to her why he'd be so certain about that. The picture in her mind was not pleasant. Clef was curious by nature, and he would have been even more so on arrival. He probably hadn't wasted a moment before reading the provided literature.

"There really ought to be some kind of warning along with this thing," she said, glaring over at her omnicomm for a moment. "It's not fair to just spring it on people."

"But how do you warn for something like that?"

Of course, as soon as he said that he thought of several ways one could potentially do so.

"Tastefully, I mean."

"Really, just a note to read it on your own would be sufficient. Or with a friend," she answered. Her gaze softened. "Was Fuu there then? Did she help?"

(One might wonder why she had so quickly shifted the focus of this conversation back to him. It was because, although she had accepted the news on some level, it still felt strange to her, and she didn't know how to feel about it beyond horribly sad. Sitting around crying wouldn't accomplish anything but making her feel a little woozy afterwards. She needed time to process and figure out what was next for her. In the meantime, it was very easy to fall into that old habit of hers -- taking care of people. Him, especially.)

"Fuu and I were part of the same group, which for whatever reason was much larger than yours," he explained. "So we both made the same mistake before even realizing that the other was on the ship and awake."

Clef looked down and smiled a little. It was sort of funny, when you thought about it like that.

"We got to talk about it later, though. I think we both helped each other."

It didn't seem that odd that she kept switching the subject back to him. Clef had often wondered, in his darker moments, how other people even dealt with this. He would have asked someone by now if there had seemed to be a good way to bring it up. What Presea was doing was not really any different, even if she tried to couch it in trying to take care of him.

She nodded, letting a smile cross her face for a moment.

"I'm glad she's here. Although it doesn't seem fair to keep pulling the Knights into battles that aren't their own."

She shook her head.

"It seems a bit silly to protest being drafted into something so important, though."

Although she'd been bothered by the idea at first, the fact remained that this whole thing was bigger than her. Whole galaxies were at risk. She'd support it the best way she could. It was the right thing to do, no matter how difficult.

"I guess we'll just have to carry it with us, the best we can. Cephiro won't be forgotten."

She found his hand and squeezed it in promise.

He squeezed her hand in return as though reciprocating the promise - Cephiro would live on in their hearts, even if it was gone forever. The whole issue of the war was so much more complicated than that, though. It wasn't until after his first couple of missions that Clef had realized the full implications of their position - that they had no choice in whether to fight, regardless of whether it was really the right thing.

"There are a lot of things we need to tell you that aren't in the guide," he said. "Later."

He squeezed her hand again.

"All right," she agreed. If he had more terrible revelations, she really wasn't sure she could deal with them right now. She felt exhausted, both emotionally and physically, and couldn't hide her yawn.

"Tell me one good thing," she said, a bit sleepily. "There has to be at least one good thing about being on this ship."

Clef unsuccessfully tried to stifle a ~~tiny and adorable~~ yawn and then replied, "Stacy herself seems to genuinely feel affection for us and want to protect us. I have to confess that I like her very, very much.

"It's different for everyone, though."

Presea smiled. She wasn't surprised by his answer. He'd always had a strong connection to the nonhumans around them, and it was no wonder that he liked Stacey. She could remember the warmth voice that spoke when she had awoken, the reassurance. She had no doubt either that Stacey cared about them.

"I think you're right," she said. "I think I'll like her too."

He smiled and leaned back against the pillows, still holding her hand. There didn't seem to be much else to say right now, and they both seemed tired.

It took a little bit of shifting in the small bed (especially since she didn't want to let go of his hand either), but she settled herself in beside him, yawning again. She'd hardly been awake for a few hours, but she was already ready to go back to sleeping. She hoped for pleasant dreams.

She thought she might have them with him beside her.

"Let's take a nap," she said, settling into the bunk happily.

Apparently, Clef was not allowed to go anywhere, since there was going to be hand-holding and sleeping at the same time now. He yawned and briefly wondered what this meant - not, he supposed, that he really minded if it meant something. And it could mean anything they wanted it to.

With that last thought, he settled into sleep.

[closed; backdated to just after podpops]

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