she has slept more in two weeks than she has in the past two months. they've been heavy rests, guided under with prescribed narcotics. eight hour blips into the void - then bleary-eyed and upright, a coffee in one hand and paperwork in the other. 

she is by the port to sign papers. to check supplies. something inane. she can't really focus on it, not knowing that several clicks away he's somewhere. untouchable. unreachable. as he had been in that log cabin in the woods. except this time she does not fly overhead on dragonback to remind him that she is here, and she is trying to get them home.

in all actuality, she is scurrying back to her hotel, head down and fingers shaking in anticipation of the listless calm before her slumber. she takes streets home familiar to her, wincing under the lights of old haunts, and does not stop immediately when she hears her name called. 

she turns, blinking owlishly, and she quashes the turning of her stomach with a terse knotting of her slender fingers together.

"i'm here for work," she says, as though to assure him she hadn't come to bother him. to blow up his life anymore than she already has. her voice is still rasped. it's the only obvious giveaway that she's been through the ringer, save for the weight she's lost. the thinness in her cheeks. the wiry sinew of her arms is lost in her bulky blue knit sweater. 

but he...could have turned away.

she hesitates. her hip throbs, reminding her of her date with her percocet.

"can i buy you a drink?"

KING WAYLAND

☉

okay.

say it. say okay and turn around. say okay and let him go. she knows that look. she knows how taut his muscles are, that he's fighting the same way she always fought. for how pissed off he got at her for hiding things from him, drawing his emotions from him has always been like pulling teeth.

okay.

"it's probably not."

okay.

"can i do it anyway?"

KING WAYLAND

☉

her shoulders relax. she hadn't even realized she'd drawn them up, breath taut with nervous anticipation. at his sure, pale eyes drink him in with a greedy hunger - for a flash and nothing more - and then she remembers herself, turning her head and her heel. 

she steps neatly off the sidewalk and crosses the street to a place they've never been to, though one of their regular spots when they tired of nameless is only a few blocks away. it might be too much, that. 

inside is stuffy in the way most dive bars in slateport are. the salted air has rubbed into the foundation of the building, bloating coarse wood with the smell of the sea. and oh, how she's come to loathe that scent.

she posts them up at a bar table, the corner of her mouth twitching in a half-grimace as she lifts herself into her stool.

"one drink," she promises. "and then you can go." she scratches idly at a ruddy patch of skin on the side of her neck.

she teases a smile that doesn't reach her eyes. "shots aren't allowed."

KING WAYLAND

☉

she is not supposed to mix alcohol with her painkillers. it will be a horrendous, rough night without them. even now, sitting as she is and not laying flat on her back, recovering from the day, is a feat in itself. 

it doesn't matter. 

"the same," she says with a slight inclination to the bartender, gaze never leaving king's face.

it's what normal people ask. it's also what strangers ask. she doesn't like it. she wants to ask how delta is. she wants to ask do you miss me like i miss you? do you even remember about me most of the time?

"terrible," she says. black bar napkins are placed in front of them; the whiskey follows soon after. her time limit starts. she eyes the brown liquid and takes a small sip, licking cracked lips. 

"there are good moments, because they're inevitable, but mostly i'm terrible." her nose wrinkles. it's not very good whiskey. "and you?"

KING WAYLAND

☉

she should want him to be happy, but it gives her solace to know he's been just as miserable as her. it's the truth, too, because she's never known him to lie to her.

at his comment, she laughs. her fingers dimple the edge of the whiskey glass and she shakes her head and she thinks there is so much i want to say to you and thinking of it all now gives her a somewhat crazed smile, wide golden eyes. 

"but i was magnificent. it didn't hit me until a few days later, what i'd done, but - " her breath hitches, "i gave them hell." you would have been proud. she ducks her nose into the rotgut and it burns going down her throat. the taste of embers lingers upon her tongue. "i held off two avatars, their legendaries, and gave them hell."

KING WAYLAND

☉

something about his face changes. a scowl embittered by her triumph and her pride flashes with a hot vein of anger, but she stomachs that too with another taste. her brows knit because he asks her a question and she - 

must only tell the truth. 

"elisabeth. and - " she hesitates; her glow fades and she runs her tongue along her teeth. "fernando. tapu fini did something to him, but he's recovering now. i don't think he'd..."

she exhales and then chews the inside of her cheek. "you've been okay? safe? no one's stopped by?"

KING WAYLAND

☉

the silence that lapses between them is telling. she has no idea what he's thinking, but she swears she sees a glimmer of...jealousy? or is it just his own insecurity? over what, she's no idea, but it's a similar look she's glimpsed moments before he smothered it after a mentioning of alex.

"good," she says, relaxing somewhat, though her own look crosses over her face. one she's always been terrible at hiding. her brows furrow. "yeah, she did. i've - i've been on a lot of painkillers. she came by when i was a little worse off." she thumbs her temple.

she fiddles with her half-empty glass. too soon, too soon, too soon.

"but mostly i've been working. working on pokemon rehabilitation. working on the amnesty program for rocket defects. working on making sure we're on the right track." she licks her lips. "and...missing you."

KING WAYLAND

☉