CLive sits on the side of the bed with his head in his hands as Edith stands with her back leaned against the wall across from him. She says nothing as she waits for him to finish processing, though it's slowly getting to the point where she's wondering if he's had a malfunction. She really hopes not, as that would mean they have to go back to Regan, which they don't have time for.
Finally, he looks up at her. "So... somehow, you learned that for our strike on the Citadel, we can't bring Alexas, Catia, and York, but you don't know why... not only that, but we have less than two days to finish preparing and... what, surrender to Latanya? Because if we don't... a different Cogency Elite will come in her place and force you to go to the Citadel, ruining our plan..." He runs it all over again, checking her eyes to make sure he's right.
She nods. "Yep. That's about it." She clears her throat.
He sighs and drops his hands from his head limply. "And you learned this how?"
Edith slightly tenses. "I... overheard Latanya and her soldiers talking about it in her camp while I was out thinking. She seemed pretty serious about it," she explains and hopes he doesn't catch her lie. She can't tell if he knows that wasn't true or not, but he ignores it anyway.
"So what do we do?"
"Not much we can do. We now have our deadline. We need to be in the Citadel by the third day, leaving us two days to make sure we have everything ready. I already informed Cree of the situation. The bomb should be arriving tomorrow around noon, so I'd say we should finalize the plan before then, so once we have it, we are ready to move out," Edith says.
CLive nods slowly. "Right... assuming it's true. For all we know, we could be killing thousands, if not millions of innocents by not bringing the other three. How do we know Latanya didn't actually know you were listening and wasn't just bluffing when you overheard?"
Edith bites her lip. It takes all the will she has to keep steady eye contact with him. Of all people, CLive is probably the one she hates lying to most. "Because... what good would that do? If she was trying to trick us into not bringing the others, the only thing that would do is ensure the people within the Citadel will die. She works for Alain, so I doubt her goal here is mass genocide of his people," she reasons.
He grumbles and looks down. "Let's hope that's true..." He sighs. "Now... is there anything else I should know?" he asks and looks back up at her.
She looks to the floor and nervously taps her fingers against her leg. "I... yeah..." She clears her throat again. "I think... maybe we should make sure that everyone gets out of the Citadel before we blow it up... even..." She glances at him. "...Even Alain."
He sits up straight and stares at her in question. "What? Why? The bastard deserves to die for everything he's done. We can't just forget about what he did, not only to you and me but to John. Where is this coming from?"
"I just... we're going through all this trouble to show that we aren't violent... wouldn't killing Alain send mixed messages? I mean, yes. He deserves it. But what we're doing isn't for revenge, it's for justice. Freedom for the SRL. We can't forget that," she explains. She hates to admit it given her personal vendetta with Alain, but her reasoning makes sense to her. As much as she wishes to see Alain dead, there would honestly be little to no point in it.
But, as expected, CLive doesn't feel the same way. He frowns. "Are you... defending him? I thought you of all people would be all for avenging John," he says. She can see in his eyes and feel alongside her EPC how he fights to resist the urge to become angry. It's a feeling she hates.
She purses her lips and keeps her eyes away from him. He narrows his eyes on her. "Edith... what is going on? Lately, you've been distant, moody, and reserved. And now you're even starting to make... rather questionable calls. I know this can't all be because of the Pull, so please, just tell me what's going on," he says. His anger quickly dissolved into defeat which is carried in his tone.
Edith tenses and closes her eyes, her own nerves cutting into her EPC and making her stomach churn. "It's nothing... I've just been focused on the war. That's all," she states sharply. CLive shakes his head.
"I know you have, but that's not it. If this was just about the war, you wouldn't be getting defensive every time I turn the focus on you. When we made up, you made me promise to talk to you when something was bothering me. The same goes for you. I need to know what's going on. You can talk to me, Edith. You should know that by now."
Edith takes a deep breath. "I know... but I just... I don't..." She sighs in defeat. CLive sits and waits as Edith tries gathering her thoughts together. The feeling she has that's been eating away at her she doesn't think she can find the words to describe. Knowing that is probably the scariest thing for her right now. Not the war or the Pull or the impending feeling of doom that lurks around every corner and hangs dreadfully in the air, worsening with every breath. But now, it's slowly becoming a fear that she'll soon be forced to face. She doesn't want to face it.
She opens her eyes but keeps them trained on the floor, unable to meet CLive's eyes as the feeling worsens. "...I'm just scared, CLive..." she says quietly.
He watches her carefully. "Of what? Losing me like you said before?" he asks.
"I guess so..." she mumbles.
He nods slowly and moves to lay back in the bed, his back propped up against the pillows and wall. "Doll, c'mere." He motions her over.
She looks at him fully in question. "CLive... why?"
He sighs. "See, Edith. This is the problem. Normally when I'd say that you'd jump on me before I had a chance to realize what's happening. Instead, you're standing there looking at me as if I'm nothing more than a stranger. If I'm going to help you, I'm going to need you to trust me again. Please."
"I... I do trust you, CLive..." she says. It's not him she doesn't trust.
"Then prove it." He sits and waits expectantly. Edith takes a deep breath and slowly approaches him. He reaches out and gently grabs her hand, pulling her over him and sitting her in his lap with his hands on her waist. She keeps her eyes directed away from his and just stares at the bed beside them. CLive studies her demeanor and nods to himself. "As I'm sure you're aware, I'm scared too. But you probably can't tell all the details through the link alone, can you? Want me to explain?" he asks. She says nothing and slightly nods.
He looks at her face closely. "I'm scared of losing you too. But not only in the sense of you getting killed or becoming Insentient. The fear I have... I started getting it when you locked yourself in your room back in Sage," he starts. She subtly glances at him out of the corner of her eye.
"I would talk to you, but I never got a response. I didn't blame you, considering what you were going through. But... I was used to talking to you, having conversations with you face-to-face. I knew you were there, well at first, anyway... Knowing that I was talking to you, you were hearing me, but you never said anything... it gave me... doubts. Fears I wasn't used to having." He looks down.
"I had no way of knowing what you were thinking or how you were feeling. I was afraid that you would grow distant to me. That you no longer felt the way you used to. Knowing that you were there, but I couldn't hold you or love you because you had that locked door between us... it hurt."
Edith looks away again and bites her lip. She knew how he was feeling at that time, and yet she kept the door locked. She shut him out because she was afraid. Even before she decided to run away, she was afraid. But she didn't know why, and still doesn't. There are no words for the feeling.
He continues, "but then, I read your note. It reassured me that all those doubts were just in my head. My fears went away, for a little while at least... When I came after you and saw you again, I thought everything was better. I thought we would be fine and my doubts could be buried. But I came here, only to find that you're not yourself... you don't look at me the same way." He takes a deep breath as he stares at her.
"You rarely talk to me about anything but the war, and when I try talking to you about you or us, you close yourself off. There's no locked door between us, and yet I still feel like there is. Because you're right here in front of me. I'm holding you and telling you I love you. But you can't even look at me. You're in front of me, but I still feel like I'm losing you... is it really too much to ask... why?"
His voice is both desperate and defeated, as if he doesn't even know if his words are amounting to anything or if they're going in one ear and out the other.
Edith meets his eyes to show him her pooling tears. "The truth is I don't know why... I don't know what's going on." Her voice is cracking and she is shaking her head sporadically.
He cups her cheek to steady her shaking. "You said you were scared. What's making you so afraid, Edith? Please," he asks.
She grabs his wrist and lowers his hand from her face. "I'm scared because you're right." Her tears start flowing in streams.
"What do you mean?" CLive pushes.
Edith stares brokenly into his eyes with pleading fear behind the blur of tears. Hearing him tell her his fears has made hers more clear. "I—I can feel myself growing distant to you and I don't know why! I love you and I don't want that to change! I don't know what's happening and that terrifies me!" She begins to weep and her trembling worsens.
He instantly wraps his arms around her back and pulls her against him, fighting his own shaking by gently rubbing her back and rocking her back and forth. She hesitates to hold him back, but places her arms around his sides and hugs him stiffly.
He nods slowly. "I noticed you've been different ever since... that night... in Sage," he says with uncertainty. She carefully leans back to meet his eyes again.
He smiles woefully. "...I consider that night to be one of the greatest nights of my life... There's not one thing about it I would change... but..." He looks away. "But I can't help but feel like it wasn't for you... If that's the case... I need to know. Did I... do something wrong?" He nervously meets her eyes again.
She shakes her head. "No. That's not it at all, I swear. That night was perfect in every way. The way you trusted me... How, despite doing something you've never done and being seen in a way no one has ever seen you before... you felt comfortable. You weren't one bit nervous with me, which was enough to make that night something I will never forget. But..."
"...But you still feel like you're going distant to me. The only other thing that changed between us that night was the implant. Could that be it? Maybe feeling the Pull or my emotions in general has changed the way how you yourself feel..." CLive alludes.
Edith shrugs. "Maybe... I don't know. I just want it to stop. Not just because I never want to stop loving you, but because I can tell how it's changing the way you feel as well. You believe you're losing me, which is why you don't care about what happens to you when you have to face Alain."
She goes to look away, but he cups her cheek again and makes her look at him. "When I talk to Alain, I'll ask him if he knows of any other way to stop the Pull that doesn't involve merging. If he does know of a way and he tells me, once we destroy the Citadel, I'm going to do whatever I have to. Then the Pull will stop for both of us, and you won't need the implant anymore. We'll talk to Regan and get it removed and hopefully that will make this feeling you're having go away," he reassures her.
"But I thought Regan said it's impossible to remove an implant."
CLive nods. "Yes. It's true that once you've got an implant it shouldn't be taken out. But the only reason people say it's impossible is because it could potentially be dangerous. People have been known to either die or fall into madness if anything goes wrong in the removal process. But if anyone can do it without problems, it's Regan. It's either that or let this feeling continue," he explains.
Edith nods as well. "Okay... if it makes this stop, I'll do it..." She looks down.
CLive lets his hand fall from her cheek and returns it to her waist. He reinforces his hold on her and keeps his eyes locked on her face as he stills her before him. She waits for him to say something but looks at him when she's met only with silence. He has an expectant look worn across his face and patient eyes, as well as a subtle hint at a smile with the way the corners of his mouth twitch up.
She rolls her eyes. "You're going to say it, aren't you?" She grins emptily and waits to hear him say what she has grown so used to being reminded of.
But instead, he just shakes his head. "No. I'm not," he says simply. This grabs her attention and her empty grin fades away. CLive remains patient and nods once. "I want to hear you say it," he states.
Edith sighs and looks down. "CLive..." she murmurs and shakes her head as well.
He stiffens his grip on her again which makes her look back at his face. "I need to be sure you believe it," he says and waits with good nature.
She's heard him say it so many times that she admits it's begun to lose its meaning. She remembers hearing him say it as far back as the first time she was attacked by Reapers, the night before she met John. She was hurt and bleeding and she could feel the burning pain of the venom seeping into her system, but he looked her in the eyes and told her that she would be okay. She didn't believe him after she made that same promise to her son right before he died. But he remained calm and repeated himself, and for some reason, she believed him. And in the end, he was right. She was okay.
But slowly over time, she kept hearing it as more and more things kept going wrong. She would hear it in times when it seemed like nothing would get better. So to her, the words have almost become a bad omen. A way of reminding her of the mess they're in.
Edith looks down and takes a deep breath. "...Everything will be okay," she says quietly and looks back into his eyes to see they hold pride. He grins and eagerly nods for her to keep going. She rolls her eyes. "I promise..." she mumbles begrudgingly.
He glares at her and keeps the grin. "Less sarcasm this time?" he requests. She growls and smiles. Her face softens and she places her hands on his shoulders.
"I promise," she repeats in a compassionate whisper and presses her forehead to his.
He smiles as well. "See? That wasn't so hard, was it?" He chuckles. She sighs.
"I guess not..." she says quietly. CLive leans back to look at her clearly.
"When was the last time you said it?" he asks curiously.
Edith gently places her hand in the center of his chest and nods to herself. "After what happened here, in Idyll, a year ago... after you were gone. I held your EPC and said it... I wanted it to be true..."
He smiles and grabs her chin, turning her face to look at him again. "And did it come true?" he asks and lets her chin go.
Her eyes dance across his face, taking in the sight of him in front of her. He looks almost exactly like he did back before the Fall of Idyll, only less like a machine. He looks human now and she admittedly isn't sure if she misses the fact that he never used to hide what he was. He was unique in both appearance and personality, but she doesn't care about how he looks human now. So long as he remains himself and is happy, that's all that matters to her. But the way he looks now is a constant reminder of how close she came to losing him back then. They still don't know how it's possible his EPC survived his body getting a grenade dropped on him.
Despite not being religious, she has questioned if it was some kind of act of a god, shielding him from death. Maybe it was some technical reason that perhaps his endoskeleton was strong enough to take the full blow and save his core. Or maybe it really was nothing more than a grace of luck that allows her to be sitting here, a year later, staring at him and still seeing his smile as though nothing had happened. As though she hadn't watched him die.
Edith blinks back more tears and smiles bright, nodding her head slowly. "Yeah... it did," she whispers sweetly.
CLive chuckles. "So maybe there is some truth to it after all. Maybe, and just hear me out..." He leans close to her face. "Maybe things won't always be a mess. Maybe it's possible that one day, things will be better." He leans back again.
She chuckles lightly as well. "I hope so..." she says.
"I know so. I like to think of it as... day and night. Night being when everything is going wrong and you feel as though you're caught in an endless struggle to just get by. And day being when you can allow yourself to sit back and say 'life can't get better than this'. No matter what goes wrong in life, nothing changes the fact that day always comes after night. No matter how bad your 'night' is, there will eventually be a 'day' because that's just how time works. Nothing is forever. So, when I say that everything will be okay, I mean it. It may not happen right away, but it will eventually. That is the promise I make," CLive says and holds her hand gently in his own.
Edith nods with a smile. "Okay... I believe you," she says and wipes away the remnants of her tears. He sighs and lets his hands fall from her.
"Good. Now, if you're feeling better, we should get some rest and prepare for whatever chaos awaits us in the morning. We've got a lot of last-minute work to do tomorrow, which means we'll have to be up and out there before noon. And by 'we', I mean you," he teases.
She rolls her eyes and nods. "Yeah yeah, I get it... don't worry, I'll try to make it easy on you..." she mutters and rolls off his lap and onto her side next to him.
He kisses the top of her head. "That's all I ask. You've got no idea how much of a pain you can be in the mornings. I don't know how John did it when you lived in his house for a whole year." He chuckles.
She laughs. "Usually, he'd leave food across the room that was too far to reach and wait for me to smell it to wake up, then laugh at me as I struggled to decide if it was worth the effort of getting up. Then, once I got up, he would hold a glass of water over my bed and say if I try getting back in, he would pour it on my blankets so I couldn't... He was such a fucking asshole," she grumbles and shakes her head in annoyance with a small smile.
CLive laughs as well. "I'll keep that in mind for future reference." He winks.
She growls at him. "Don't you dare. Just push me to the floor if I give you trouble tomorrow morning, okay? Or just tell Cree to fire a gun next to my bed again. He is equally an asshole."
He nods and wraps his arm around her shoulders. "Noted. Now, sleep. I know you technically don't need to since you've been pushing yourself to sleep every night lately, but with the Pull and how your emotions have been all over the place, your EPC is bound to be taking quite a beating. Rest to restore all the emotional energy you lost today. And... even though I don't think it's good to indulge too often... I know that Quell helps you fall asleep easily. If you want... you can take some. Just for tonight," he says.
She shakes her head. "No... I'll be fine. Now stop talking and start sleeping. You need it too."
She adjusts herself to lay comfortably at his side and closes her eyes, waiting to slip into a blissful state of not having to worry or think about the real world, if only for a short time.
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Notes:
Day always comes after night.