𝒐𝒑𝒆𝒏.

[demainvient]

𝒂𝒄𝒕𝒊𝒐𝒏 ⊹ 𝒆𝒑𝒊𝒔𝒕𝒐𝒍𝒂𝒓𝒚 ⊹ 𝒗𝒊𝒔𝒖𝒂𝒍
 

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[maellum]

[The knot in her throat grows. She doesn't want to talk about moving forward. Kill the Paintress. Kill Renoir. After that--she can't fathom what the world looks like. What Emma would look like, hearing her brother died. What his apprentices will look like, when she hands them Gustave's journal, her own accounts splotched with teardrops and lacking his attention to detail.

She doesn't know what to say. So little helps the pain. After a quiet that feels too long, hands twisting the handkerchief in her lap, she swallows around the heavy lump in her throat.]

You miss Sophie. I try to... remember that. Maybe you'll figure out how to make it work by the time I see you again, yeah?

[While she doesn't know exactly why they broke up, she's sure he fumbled. Somehow. Probably. That thought gives her some solace. The next life.]

[demainvient]

[ There's a small tug to the corner of his mouth that can't decide if it wants to be a smile or a frown. He looks down at his hands, loose on his thighs, and for a moment whatever expression shifts across his face is hidden to her. ]

Yeah. Maybe.

[ He looks back up again, then shifts his chair out from the table and a little closer to her, reaching to carefully cup his hands around the ones she has twisting that scrap of cloth. His voice is gentle, even with the faintest edge of brotherly teasing that had once laced so much of what he told her. ]

But don't rush, please. Live. Be happy.

[maellum]

[It's no wonder he and Sciel got along so well. In some topsy turvy world she thinks they both would have been wonderful parents together, and maybe in some way they were to her, though at different times. Still, Maelle is entirely biased--Gustave's warmth and way of knowing what just to say is unique to him, to their bond.]

I'll stop her. I'll stop the Paintress, and I'll kill him for what he did to us. To everyone. Just...

[Glassy eyes meet his, serious, even if she sounds childish to her own ears.]

Make me a new promise. Don't forget me. I promise to live as long as you wait for me this time.

[Living is easy. Being happy is another matter.]

[demainvient]

Maelle.

[ It comes out on the breath of a laugh, his fingers squeezing hers, warm and familiar. ]

I'm more likely to forget myself than I am to forget you. It'll never happen.

[ Clinging to memory has its own dangers... could he become a shattered, fading remnant of himself, hardly able to even remember words, let alone names or faces, like those strange, ashen figures they found throughout the continent? Perhaps. He has no more answers here than she does.

But this is a promise he can make, and keep, and he nods to her. ]

I promise. And I'll wait for you. I'll be there with you wherever you go... just out of sight, maybe.

[maellum]

[It's not the same as having him by her side. Physically. A comfort, always, be it his remarks on whatever was going on around them, or some thought he had to share, or a joke, or a face he'd pull when only she was looking. She supposes she understands now how he must have felt losing his arm. He's her lost limb, some part of her gone forever, but there's no fabricated part to replace him.

Verso may feel like a possibility on paper, a man missing a sister while she's missing a brother and how convenient that is, but he is not Gustave.]

A real promise, this time.

[She holds up her pinky.]

[demainvient]

A real promise, [ he agrees, and lifts his right hand to curl his own pinky around hers: an unbreakable oath now sealed, reminiscent of the many he solemnly made when she was so much younger than she is now.

She has so much life left to live. All he can hope is that she gets the chance to live it. ]

I should probably try to tell you something trite about forgiveness being the better path.

[ He lifts his eyebrows at her, then shakes his head, shoulders and chest lifting with a long, deep breath. ]

But I won't. When you're ready, when you're strong enough—

[ His pinky finger tightens a little on hers as he gives her hand a little shake. ]

Bring him hell.

[maellum]

For you, and for everyone at the beach.

[That day haunted them all, but Gustave, especially. Maelle drops her hand back down to her lap, watching him. She has so many questions, so many conversations to have yet, but she knows she could spend a lifetime with him and still not be done.

One does manage to come to the forefront and make it out of her mouth, however.]

Were you there? Beneath that tree in the forest. Where we laid you to rest. Could you hear us?

[She hopes so. For Lune and Sciel's sake, too.]

[demainvient]

[ In this dream, he still has the left arm she'd placed so tenderly there beneath the waving leaves and branches of the trees that stood silent sentinel over the graves of so many expeditioners. Maybe it's right that he be there, among so many of his compatriots... those who went before. ]

It was a nice place. Peaceful.

[ And peace has eluded them all for such a long time. ]

Sciel and Lune will want to take care of you. I think you should let them.

[maellum]

They're not you.

[They're dear to her, but they're not Gustave. He was supposed to be her final one. Try as they might, she knows that bond between her and Gustave was something unique. They simply fit well, hearts or souls or natures aligned.]

You set the bar too high, I guess.

I have finished the game.... time 2 cry....

[demainvient]

I know.

[ He watches her, hands loosely clasped in his lap, before taking a quick breath in and straightening, visibly trying to shift her mood to something a little more lighthearted. ]

You're never this nice... You really must miss me.

the crying never stops.... this game!!!!!!

[maellum]

[He does make her breathe out something that sounds near enough to a laugh, throat still tight. Even now, he still can manage to make her smile. Even if it's sad around the edges.]

I do. I really, really do.

[A single tear rolls down her round cheek, falling off her chin.]

I was so desperate to see the world before my Gommage. So determined to go with you on the expedition. But, I think... no. I know, a part of me didn't want to face what the world would be like without you. If you died on the expedition, what were the chances I'd survive?

[Higher than she realized, apparently.]

I didn't want this.

[demainvient]

[ The moment she'd decided to go on the expedition, to fight alongside him, he'd known this was a possibility. Maybe it was the only end he could have expected, giving his life in defense of hers. It's a decision he can be at peace with.

Not so Maelle, though she has to have known this would always be his choice, if they were forced into this particular corner. She's still so young; she'd only expected to say goodbye to him with the Gommage. It can be hard for the people of Lumière to remember that there are other, more abrupt ways to die. ]

I know.

[ Sciel hadn't expected to lose Pierre the way she had, either. He hadn't expected to lose Sophie, in a less final but no less complete way all those years ago. ]

If it helps, I'm not that thrilled about it, either.

[maellum]

Yeah. I know. I'm... it's okay. I mean, it's not okay, but... I'm not mad at you. I could never be.

[She's a teenager. Inevitably, they had their spats, her silent treatments and little acts of rebellion here and there over the years. But he died for her. She knew, always, he would never let harm come to her if he had any say in the matter.

She just never thought she'd watch him go to the slaughter before her very eyes. She can still recall the heat of his blood on her face.]

I know you'd rather be with us.

[demainvient]

[ The unfairness of it all is the unkindest cut. Maybe he willingly went to his own doom, an engineer turned expeditioner turned warrior, with some attempt at nobility, at bravery. But none of that erases the fact that he chose that doom not on his own power, but out of desperation. He'd been stabbed in the back, killed right before Maelle's eyes. His choices were ripped away from him. ]

It would be all right, if you were mad at me. I'd understand.

[ A promise broken, a brother destroyed, the life she could almost touch with the tips of her fingers shattered in the blink of an eye. How could he blame her for being angry when she has lost so much, and so much of it at his own hands? ]

[maellum]

No. [She shakes her head, the reply immediate.] I can't. [There's another small, rueful smile.] Might have made all of this easier if I did, wouldn't it?

[Her love and respect and understanding of him is too great. If she hated him, she wouldn't carry so many beautiful memories in her heart that felt like handling shards of glass when she looked back on them. Afternoons at the Hanging Gardens. Peering over his shoulder at whatever he was working on in the early light of morning. Pestering him for a stroll to the harbor when the skies were clear. Making him laugh over a meal right when he took a drink. So many little moments, kept close to her heart, but all so important. Reminders of how much he loved her, and how safe he made her feel. In the end, that was his final gift.]

I'm only mad at the person that did this.

[She'll make him feel it. Her pain, her rage, her sorrow.]

[demainvient]

[ The person who did this: the man who stole him from her, who stole the future of the whole expedition except for their small handful of battered bodies. ]

Don't let him bait you into confronting him before you're ready, [ he warns. Don't get cocky, Maelle. ]

You saw what happened. I barely touched him.

[maellum]

[She looks at him, grave, and nods. She'll never forget what she saw.]

The Paintress makes him immortal. Once we kill her, I'll kill him.

[Gustave would have been able to kill him if he were a normal man. But a normal man wouldn't have been able to nearly wipe them out at the beach.]

I miss you terribly, but I promise to finish this for you.

[demainvient]

[ He nods back: another promise, forged. ]

You can do this, Maelle.

[ It's so quiet in this dream of their old home that his voice could be just barely more than a murmur and still clear enough for her to hear. ]

You can break the cycle.

[maellum]

[She can do this. There's no other option. She refuses to fail and see Gustave's hard work all for naught; his sacrifice, meaningless.]

When I do... I hope you'll visit me. Just like this.

[But she doesn't ask him to promise her that.]

I could stay here forever.

[demainvient]

[ He sees the determination in her, in the set of her jaw, the look in her clear pale eyes. It's not an expression he ever hoped to see on her, not for this, but he understands, all the same. ]

Don't worry about that. I'll always find you, right?

[ And here, in this strange liminal space where he is and is not the Gustave who loved her, protected her, laughed with her, comforted her, some paths are easier to find than others. Hers will always be clearly lit for him.

Gently: ]

You have to wake up sometime. Don't waste your life in a dream.

[maellum]

Yeah. [She knows she must wake, sometime, to do the things she promised. She blinks rapidly, eyes perpetually threatening to overflow with tears.] I only have a life at all because of you. You made me who I am.

[For better or for worse--a thing she would joke about, normally, but they haven't had normal in a very long time. Sniffling, she rallies, taking a deep breath. She can be strong in hopes of seeing him smile at her. That's what she wants to remember and carry with her.]

I think you did pretty good.

[demainvient]

[ She wins her smile, warm and sweet and fond, layers of love and wistfulness in his dark eyes as he looks at her. ]

You made it easy. I only wish I could get to see the person you'll become.

[ They've been robbed of so much: his future, theirs together. But he hopes she can still live hers. ]

[maellum]

Yeah. Me too. That hurts more than I ever thought it would. Even knowing...

[Their chances of him seeing her grow into adulthood were always slim. Just as she would never see him actually become an old man. He would be ageless, stuck frozen in time for her. They didn't talk about it as much as they should have, hopes and dreams put into the expedition, but maybe they should have.]

I wish you'd taken me in sooner.

[The only way they would have had more time together is from the start. She smiles, amused by the idea of a Gustave in his early twenties, trying to manage her.]

[demainvient]

Hey, hey.

[ They could spend hours, days mourning the what-ifs and the could-have-beens. It's a distraction she can't afford, not now. She'll have to carry her grief along with her in a pocket for a while; her focus needs to be on other things.

He sets one arm on the table, leaning toward her. ]

I wish we had longer, too. But nothing can ever take away the time we did have. Nothing. You will always have that.

[maellum]

[It comes with a beat of hesitation, but she nods, knowing he's right. A hundred years would have never been enough--how could their handful come close? He loved her as much as she loves him. It's only difficult, being the one left behind, with nowhere for that love to go.]

I'll tell you my favorite thing we would do together if you tell me yours.

[She thinks she knows. The smile comes with a sniffle. Maybe she shouldn't let herself sink into the past. Maybe she should only look forward, at least until their expedition is finished. But she tells herself she needs this. This will keep her going when the despair tries to choke her.]

So when we meet again, some day, we can do them right away.