As one of few women permitted to enter these communal baths, Elisabeth rarely made use of them. The Rocket personnel in charge of overseeing the limited access to this area understood her preference for having the premises entirely to herself, with a single exception.[break][break]

One that, apparently, had arrived here long before her.[break][break]

Elisabeth suppressed a smile as she approached the unaware admin from behind, debating if she ought to startle him. He'd deserve it, for he so often enjoyed startling her. A splash to the face wouldn't be unwarranted.[break][break]

Loosening her robe with a shrug of her shoulders, she chose a different tactic as she silently submerged herself in the water.[break][break]

A manicured hand sneakily plucked the Lechonk soap from his grasp, turning it over with palpable amusement.[break][break]

"I didn't realize you liked decorative soaps," she teased, the sound of her hushed voice tickling his ear. He'd feel the softness of her skin pressed against his back, nearer than any friend or acquaintance would dare as she nuzzled her cheek into the crook of his shoulder. "You should have told me. I could make something like this quite easily, you know."[break][break]

Then her line of sight drifted to the bruises purpling his wrist, and her tone sharply changed.[break][break]

"What happened? Who did this to you?"

[attr="class","ooc"] BARNABY FINCH[break][break]

[attr="class","pkmn"]

"Consensual?" she repeated, the aggressive thoughts that had entered her mind prior not exactly dwindling with the notion. A different indignation hissed inside her like a roused Seviper, looking for a target to sink its fangs into.[break][break]

Still, relief that no one had harmed him in any serious way lingered, and it showed in how she tenderly resumed the lathering of his wrists for him.[break][break]

She hummed a bit, distracting herself from the black and blue splotches that marred his skin, before curiosity drove her to speak again.[break][break]

"Training too hard, are we? Or...?" This would have to be navigated carefully. A pause sat between the words before she ventured, slowly, "Has someone else been keeping you company for me?"[break][break]

She hoped she sounded nonchalant. Given how well he knew her, however, he might see through that flimsy attempt at indifference.[break][break]

An attempt, regardless, had been made.

[attr="class","ooc"] BARNABY FINCH[break][break]

[attr="class","pkmn"]

On some subconscious level, Elisabeth had suspected this of him. Early on, she had even hoped for it as some barrier between the feelings she knew would develop for him otherwise. Unfortunately, that barrier had failed her.[break][break]

She had taken his confession to her a different way than he'd intended it, then. The moment her work with MATIAS SILPH was done, she'd intended to be content with BARNABY FINCH -- she'd long stopped seeing anya fowl in Lilycove, and no other relationship had caught her attention.[break][break]

For some reason, she'd assumed the same of him.[break][break]

"It's fine," she said, which was perhaps the wrong thing to say, but was her more convincing herself than the man across from her. She began to soap his arms, trailing upwards towards his biceps, and continued, "THEO BECKETT asked me what your favorite flower was for Palentine's Day. I didn't realize you had so many admirers in the upper echelon, I suppose, that's all."[break][break]

Did she sound bitter? She desperately was trying not to, but this was not her strong suit.

[attr="class","ooc"] BARNABY FINCH[break][break]

[attr="class","pkmn"]

She froze, astonished at the way he rattled off all her previous encounters aloud. What a gross exaggeration it was, she thought, and she retracted her hand with indignation.[break][break]

”Whatever company I knew before I slept with you is my business,” she said tartly, referring to the professor and councilman respectively. Both those chapters had ended before she had pursued Barnaby in earnest; in fact, neither had overlapped with the other, either. She had ended both on her own terms, or so she thought. ”And MATIAS SILPH is work. You know that.”[break][break]

She had assumed it was the only reason he had been comfortable with that whole affair.[break][break]

“I haven’t seen the scientist since the night you said your heart was mine, if that matters to you,” she said, and whether or not she meant to, it was clear she was sulking. ”I don’t have a network keeping surveillance on you the way you do on me. But yes, Beckett was very clear with me that you had slept with one another.”[break][break]

The soap Lechonk was lightly tossed at his back with annoyance.[break][break]

”He suggested I had reason to be jealous. Should I be?”

[attr="class","ooc"] BARNABY FINCH[break][break]

[attr="class","pkmn"]

Where he rose to his full height, she sank lower into the water, avoiding his stare. There was something so disappointing in his gaze as he looked down at her, and strangely, she felt as if she had been the misbehaving party between them instead of the wronged.[break][break]

What she wanted was an inherently unfair thing: the freedom to leave when she chose, coupled with the unconditional loyalty and devotion of BARNABY FINCH. The realization of this, she knew, was a thought that could never be uttered aloud. It was how a child thought, unwilling to share their toys but wanting access to others, should their own toys bore them.[break][break]

Would she bore him, eventually? That terrified her most of all.[break][break]

”I don’t want to confine you,” she said finally, looking up at him again. ”I just don’t know where we stand.”

[attr="class","ooc"] BARNABY FINCH[break][break]

[attr="class","pkmn"]

Of course she didn’t resist him. That was the problem. She’d lost all ability to do so, when it came to BARNABY FINCH.[break][break]

Nothing had really changed, had it? She arched slightly as he trailed kisses up her neck, feelings of pleasure and confusion mingling together to leave her lost. He hadn’t stopped caring for her, so why was she hesitant?[break][break]

He doesn’t love like you do, came the belated realization, despairing and relieving all at once. He doesn’t lose himself the way you do. This is your weakness, Elisabeth. You love too much.[break][break]

She should be grateful, she supposed, that this time she hadn’t given this level of power over herself to someone willing to cage her again. The last time she had fallen this deeply, she had lost everything.[break][break]

This was a mercy, wasn’t it? That his love didn’t have the same intensity as her own.[break][break]

”Of course I care about you,” she said instead, pulling him closer. Fingers wound their way into his dark hair, stroking it gently. ”You’re right. Nothing has changed.”[break][break]

This was her failing to overcome, not his.

[attr="class","ooc"] BARNABY FINCH[break][break]

[attr="class","pkmn"]