Never Hide Your Heart
As the midnight moon was drifting through
Location: Aboard Northstar
Objective: Chill
Tags:
Connel Vanagor
The hum of the Northstar's engines usually lulled Katarine Ryiah into the kind of dreamless sleep she preferred, quiet, contained, empty. Tonight, it did nothing. Darkness swallowed her whole. She stood in a ruin she knew too well, broken stone, the stink of old rituals, a cold wind whispering her name in a voice that sounded like her own. And there, at the center of it, Daxium turned toward her. His eyes weren't the soft amber she remembered. They burned, red, fractured by shadow.
"You can't keep pretending you don't hear me."
The ground cracked. Hands, child-small, memory-sharp, clawed up from below. Her brother stepped toward her, reaching, pleading, accusing—
Katarine lurched awake with a strangled gasp.
The cabin lights were low, the stars a blur through the cockpit canopy. She pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes, but it didn't stop the shaking or the echo of Daxium's voice threading through her skull. Force empathy was a gift, but in moments like this it felt like a wound that never scarred over.
She slipped out of her bunk, bare feet soft on the deck plating, and made her way to the refresher. Cold water splashed against her face, slicking back the stray locks that had escaped her band. She gripped the edge of the sink until her knuckles went pale.
Leaving. Running. That was her instinct, always had been. Put distance between herself and anything that made the bond flare or the memories stir. The nav coordinates would only take a moment to set. If she jumped now, before dawn cycle…
Katarine exhaled sharply through her nose.
Connel had asked her not to push him away. Not this time. Not over ghosts she refused to name.
She let go of the sink.
The corridor was dim, save for the soft blue stripes of emergency LEDs along the floor. She padded down it, every step feeling like a choice she wasn't sure she was ready to make. Connel's door slid open with a soft hiss.
He lay on his side atop the blankets, one arm tucked under the pillow, dark hair a mess across his forehead. Even asleep, he had that steady presence about him, gravity, warmth, something that anchored instead of chased.
Katarine hovered in the doorway for a long moment, breath hitching once as the last trace of the nightmare clawed at her chest.
Then, quietly, she stepped inside. Buster was in a small little bed in the corner and lifted his head sleepily. "Shhh." She soothed the pup who yawned in the most adorable way as Katarine crossed the room and slid into the bed next to Connel. She tried carefully not to wake him as she curled up and watched him sleep. No running... no space put between them... just the quiet comfort of his breathing and her letting her guard down, wondering if what she was doing was right.
