05-03-2020, 06:18 PM
He trusted Brandon, or maybe he needed to. She didn’t say anything else about it, though she didn’t find the conviction comfortable. Jessika Thrice’s campaign had received funding from Orion. It wasn't coincidental that their facility was in Texas so much as suspicious, which meant Natalie would wager money on Brandon’s awareness of its existence. That it had continued to exist, and meanwhile Amengual climbed the rungs to power over a new Dominance suggested its destruction might not be welcome. But those were not today’s burdens. She finished dressing and sank her time into Marcus’s app once Jay left.
When the door thrust open again it was hard enough to make her flinch. The power flared but did not unravel from her grasp as she watched it slam and bolt and Jay tumble to the floor, ready for the threat to follow even as her attention split suddenly back to him. Only his muttering filled the silent moment before she slipped from the bed, realising with a shudder that nothing else was coming. That this was a very different enemy.
“Hey,” she said softly. Her fingers flexed but it didn’t seem a good idea to reach out, even if every instinct wanted to offer that anchor. She didn’t know if the power raged beneath the shaking cage of his skin, or how he might react to whatever he mistook the touch for, but it took more self-control than she cared to admit to instead crouch before him. She shifted her weight to sit kneeling, as close as she could without touching.
“Hey,” she repeated. “It’s me. It’s me.” The same whispered words that had pulled her through the darkness of the collapsing tunnels, and still soothed sometimes in strange moments, like an echo with roots soul-deep. She hadn’t trusted it at the time, but no matter how it frayed, that connection had never snapped. She didn’t expect him to be listening; she wasn’t sure how long it would even take to recognise the cadence of her voice through the grip of his demons, but in the meantime she would sit patient as stone, witness to a pain that made her chest feel like an open wound. For as long as it took.
“There’s no one else here. Just you and me. When you look up, that’s what you’ll see. Just me, and the crappy motel room you picked in I-don’t-know-where America. Floral wallpaper, Jay. In 2046. One thousand and eight flowers, to be precise. Nine thousand and seventy…something petals. Considerably less now, I suppose, but I think you probably did them a favour.” Her words continued like that. Company in the dark, or a way back home, when he was ready to see it.
“Find five things you can see, Jay. Real things. You’ll need to look up for that.”
When the door thrust open again it was hard enough to make her flinch. The power flared but did not unravel from her grasp as she watched it slam and bolt and Jay tumble to the floor, ready for the threat to follow even as her attention split suddenly back to him. Only his muttering filled the silent moment before she slipped from the bed, realising with a shudder that nothing else was coming. That this was a very different enemy.
“Hey,” she said softly. Her fingers flexed but it didn’t seem a good idea to reach out, even if every instinct wanted to offer that anchor. She didn’t know if the power raged beneath the shaking cage of his skin, or how he might react to whatever he mistook the touch for, but it took more self-control than she cared to admit to instead crouch before him. She shifted her weight to sit kneeling, as close as she could without touching.
“Hey,” she repeated. “It’s me. It’s me.” The same whispered words that had pulled her through the darkness of the collapsing tunnels, and still soothed sometimes in strange moments, like an echo with roots soul-deep. She hadn’t trusted it at the time, but no matter how it frayed, that connection had never snapped. She didn’t expect him to be listening; she wasn’t sure how long it would even take to recognise the cadence of her voice through the grip of his demons, but in the meantime she would sit patient as stone, witness to a pain that made her chest feel like an open wound. For as long as it took.
“There’s no one else here. Just you and me. When you look up, that’s what you’ll see. Just me, and the crappy motel room you picked in I-don’t-know-where America. Floral wallpaper, Jay. In 2046. One thousand and eight flowers, to be precise. Nine thousand and seventy…something petals. Considerably less now, I suppose, but I think you probably did them a favour.” Her words continued like that. Company in the dark, or a way back home, when he was ready to see it.
“Find five things you can see, Jay. Real things. You’ll need to look up for that.”