The Elegy & Storm

[Seydon of Arda]

Core Worlds - Lytton Sector - Spira System
~Spira


Cyan water. Gold sand. White clouds. Nestled in a quiet cove three thousand clicks south and west of Ataria Island, a sleek, galvanized hulled ship was locked into a makeshift birth. Palm fronds and a thickened layer of camouflaging moss and lichen were strewn across stubby lateral wings, pegged down by duralium spikes knotted with fishgut line. Admittedly, creating such private accommodations in Spira's oceanic vastness was illegal by mandate... But Seroth Ur-Rahn was a poor boy and stubborn. He was traipsing through the relative Galactic neighborhood, needing to restock on preserved foodstuffs. Seafood would prove a welcome change from vacuum-sealed spinach, ranoch jerky meats, and stale, recycled water.



The boy stood tall out on a driftwood pier. A makeshift casting rod, more a supple, hewed palm bough, flicked and snapped a near invisible catching line and sink lure a good three hundred rods out past the beach surf. He hadn't much for bait, but figured a touch of luck was on his side. Warm winds from the west blew out and crazed his combed widow's peak, filled his nostrils with salt and the stink of scale-gull guano. Lazy, soft pounds of rushing beach tide lulled his senses; his mind slipped into quasi-meditation, running unseen 'scoops' over the idyllic sea surface. Force-compelled 'cups' of water lifted and fell at his mental suggestion. And, not for the first instance, certainly not for the last, his lips tingled with sensation. Like the taste of ginseng and some other, closely intoxicating sugar. Illusory brown eyes stared over the hazy, far horizon.



"Hmmn..." Seroth sighed, wriggling his casting rod.

 

[Rosa Gunn]

A holiday.

It was an entirely new concept for Rosa. She always placed herself knee deep in responsibility or the matter of her own mind that holidays just didn't happen. But at the last meet with the Vagrants, Qae had mentioned Spira and she found herself setting a course. White sandy beaches, crystal clear waters, warm weather, what was there to refuse? She flew the Golden Rose low over the waters, upsetting fisherman in boats and dodging islands a playful smile on her face. That was until a stern voice crackled over her comm link. "Golden Rose we have had several complaints about your flying, please increase your altitude or I will be forced to take action."

Rosa smiled "My apologies," she replied poking her tongue out at the comm link "Increasing altitude now." Playful moment over she began to fly a little more sensibly, her eyes on the scanners and she looked for an island worth her while. Somewhere quiet, and secluded somewhere she cold enjoy solitude. She felt a tug in the force, and turned her ship towards it curiosity getting the better of her. Extending her sense ahead she felt a familiar person and her heart skipped a beat.

Slowing the ship down she circled the island, reaching out to Seroth in greeting as she tried to find somewhere to land.

 

[Seydon of Arda]

The sub-sonic engine roar broke him from his brief reprieve. Seroth instinctively ducked as a hot downwash of vessel spoor wracked him with high winds, briefly shadowed. The lad adjusted, planted out his feet and cast his rod down to stare up at a gold and silvery plated vessel buck past. He wondered, briefly, if navel authorities had finally taken exception to his blatant violation of landing protocols. Yet, this yacht lacked ident-plaques or displayed authoritative insignia decals. Sea-spray leapt up over the lip of the pier and soaked into his slacks and opened, ocean-green tunic. Perhaps he'd come upon a previously occupied fishing haunt?


"...Master?" He mumbled with a mount of incredulity. The woman's blanketing presence fed into his nervous system, spreading a sensation of sun-heat from brow to toes. Seroth raised an arm, trying to wave as the yacht attempted to come about and land.


The lad dug in his toes and sprinted the length of the pier. The yacht's landing jets spat a solid wall of sand and earth-grit into his face as he ran up. Support pylons, greased and wriggling with hydraulic feeds, sunk into mossy earth beside the Iron Snake. Seroth continued jogging close, cupping hands 'round his mouth and calling out over the vessel-roar. "Master?? ...Rosa??"

 

[Rosa Gunn]

Rosa couldn't help the laugh that escaped her as she began to power down the ship, activating the boarding ramp she spun from the chair. Slender legs revealed by denim shorts, her low back halter neck top displayed more skin than normal, revealing the shining scars that ran up her left arm and left side of her back and torso, a souvenir form Roche. All in the past. there was none of the lingering grief that had surrounded her the last time they had met, she had let go. She had finally accepted what had happened and moved on from it. A step she would never have been able to take without the support of her friends.

She darted through the ship off and down the boarding ramp and threw her arms around Seroth's neck hugging him fiercely. For all she knew, that hug could have lasted an eternity, after the way they had separated last time, it was needed. Whatever tension or awkwardness that could have resulted in this was gone in an instant. She coiled her empathy around him, filling the space with her happiness at seeing him. Slowly pulling back she looked at him properly and laughed and the mud on his face. "Hi." she said with a chuckle, brushing the mud from his face.

 

[Seydon of Arda]

"If I had known...!" The lad said, turning aside to spit out fleck of grit. "If... I thought I would be having company... I... Why, have you...?"

Serendipity was capricious. Fate, destiny even more so. It was difficult to manage with the cold truths, of life lacking the fantasy of a fairy tale. Happy endings were few, far between, the boy assuming it would be many, long fortnights before he saw the glow of her sublight engines speeding through void and starlight. Brightly, the sun washed bleaching hazes of clear light and heat across their embraced frames. Giddy, boyish in his customs, the lad swept his hands into Rosa's hair and stroked down over the peach fuzz marking the catch of her skull and neck. "You look so grand..."

She did. Last he left her, by the cold of an ill-insulated transparisteel viewport, she walked dressed with a lead cape. Seemingly dissonant with the proposal of any meaningful happiness, Seroth fretted. How could life's rewards so cruelly bandy her this unhappiness when she'd sacrificed troves of personal well being? For the sake of many, for his own included. Rosa Mazhar, in the moment, looked to have regained those shades of radiance that made their brief tutelage enjoyable. The lad dipped, kissing her brow, hugging fiercely enough to lift her toes from the hot sand. "Hello to you too..."

 

[Rosa Gunn]

A small squeal escaped her as his hug lifted her from her feet. She coiled her arms about his neck in response, her soft lips brushing his cheek with a light kiss before she breathed in his ear "I'm glad you're here." The soles of her shoes settled lightly back onto the soft sand and she smiled at Seroth before drawing away, one hand remaining on him to balance herself as she pulled her shoes off one by one, throwing them carelessly onto the boarding ramp behind her.

Closing her eyes, she dugs her toes deep into the warm sand, a sigh of pleasure escaping her. Brown eyes fluttered opened scanning the beach properly, It was a beauty to behold and though she had come seeking solitude, she was far happier that she could share it's beauty with the man next to her. Her arm slipped through his and they walked back up the beach away from the ships. "I decided I needed a holiday, someone suggested Spira and so I came." From there it was a simple matter of the force drawing them together, much as it had guided her to him on Moreau Station. Rosa was loath to refuse the call of the force, more so the company of Seroth.

"I don't think I've ever had a real holiday. Any I've tried to take previously were always cut short, or spent with the nagging feeling that something had been forgotten." Realisation dawned that she might just be upsetting Seroth's own desire for solitude. "Do you mind if I join you," a small smile "On your little patch of paradise?"

 

[Seydon of Arda]

"No. No, why...?" The lad's fast habit of rapid wording stumbled his words and brought him to a brief, self-conscious halt. "I... I don't mind. But only on a condition."

Seroth wasn't ordinarily devious. Once or twice or on thrice occasion, he could recall scoldings directed at his forthright manner. Learners, even at the youngest stage, were not above exercising caution, subtlety, discretion. And so naively, the lad argued that the word of truth could not be diluted. Something he still believed, wholeheartedly, with a firmness that bordered on stubbornness. For this rare day, he turned to Rosa, hands fiddling in idle exercise behind his waist. "If you can meet it, then you are welcome to stay. For however long you want."

One wrist came around, flicking. The surf that softly roared and swept up smoothed stretches of gold sand quivered. A pailful of water rose, came hurtling overhead to hopefully grant Rosa Mazhar an invigorating splash of sea brine. Seroth was moving, sprinting to the waters, calling over his shoulder like a cheeky bugger. Ankles thudded into sea surf, propelled him on to splash head long into the warm waters, lost a moment to sight as his words rang in the sun kissed air. "You got to come for a swim!"

 

[Rosa Gunn]

Something shifted in Seroth as he halted there walk, his hands behind his back a glint of mischief in her eyes. "Alright..." she agreed, giving him a curious look, her head tilted slightly as she tried to work out what was going on in his mind. Then she caught it, the subtle shift from contemplation to action a split second before the pail of water came round. Rosa cried out in surprise and jumped back as the salt water doused her, its cool fingers trail through her hair and down her face and neck.

Seroth was away before she could do anything about it. Speed had always been a gift and she was hot on his tail as he dove into the water. She came to a halt the waves gently tickling her ankles as her quarry disappeared beneath the surface for a moment before calling out to her. "Seroth Ur-Rahn you are unbelievable!" she chastised playfully, with a shake of her head she followed suit and propelled herself into the water.

Swimming beneath its surface for a few moments, there was no sneaking up on him in crystal clear waters but she tried nonetheless, her hands coiling about his ankle to tug him, briefly back beneath the waters surface. She rose up, sucking in a deep breath of air and titled onto her back, hands working gently to keep her on the surface she closed her eyes and relished in the weightless sensation as the water lapped at her body and the sun warmed her skin. She opened an eyes to check on Seroth "I'm watching you."

 

[Seydon of Arda]

"You say that to me..." Seroth choked on brine a moment, spitting sea-water off his tongue. "You say it as if I've committed a wrongness, Miss Rosa. I have not. I simply gave you a wash you did not expect.

"But you have to admit..." He said, swimming forward in slow, languid strokes. "We would have spent too long catching up, before we found cause to just swim. The two of us can speak later, when we settle for a rest. I want to see if, Miss Rosa, you do not mind embracing the water."

The lad braced, sucked in a deep breath, and then slid beneath the idyllic glassy surface down into crystalline depths. It wasn't simply the beaches Spira was famed for, 'cross the Galactic bar. At last count, the oceans were home to a dedicated species-set of some one hundred million differing sea-borne microorganisms. Each was suited to the task of devouring and processing fish and whale spoor, digesting clouds of lifted sand grains for their mineral qualities, unseen but constantly busy. So much so that it was rumoured the deeper portions of the outer reefs possessed under water pockets of purely fresh water. Surely a physical impossibility but a reef divers persistent myth nonetheless.

Years of practiced 'Art of Movement' lent the boy unseemly agility. He made sure of Rosa's lingering sight, tossing left and up, forward and right, down and then deeper still, twisting with uncanny grace. So much like a juvenile Olympiad, glad for a Lady's attention, all too eager to impress and garner favour and fandom. Seroth took it as an opportunity for impromptu exercise, trying to subtly woo his aching lungs to preserve every molecule they could scrub, hardening his blood's oxygenation process and staving off any damage to the skin of his brain. He grinned, teeth flashing in the cyan glow, gesturing for Rosa to come join him a moment beneath the surface current.

 

[Rosa Gunn]

Rosa rolled onto her front as Seroth disappeared beneath into crystalline waters once more. She watched him twist and turn beneath her, showing off his acrobatic skills beneath the waters surface. Something sparked inside Rosa, a competitive streak to try and keep up with him. She found her eyes tracing the contoured lines of muscle that she hadn't noticed before and felt her cheeks flush at the realisation she was looking. She caught his flashed smile and raised her face from the water to take her own deep breath before plunging down after him.

Reaching Seroth she swam around him once, a playful smile on her face before darting across the top of the reef. Her hands finding holds on the coral to propel herself a little more. She rolled onto her back, looking upwards towards the surface, the sun turning the water above her into glittering diamonds. A school of silverfish swam across her vision and she looked back towards Seroth, slowly this time, the force between them working hard to keep them under the water as long as they could. As she drew level with him she found his hands, her fingers interlocking with his.

 

[Seydon of Arda]

Despite the sea water, contact with the ocean had rendered Rosa's skin as soft and pliant as wet velvet. Gently, feet kicking and taking them a little higher towards the rolling, glassy surface, he regarded her in the liquid crystal. Her hair spun behind her face in a wild, fluid tangle. If there had been any vestiges of make up, they certainly had to be void upon her face now. Though, Seroth would remind himself to compliment, she looked prettier still without. The lad was like a kid caught up in a first crush. Save he was physically grown. And Rosa a soul-wizened adult. This liaison felt scandalous. Forbidden. His shoulders scrapped against a portion of bunched, mossy coral, interrupting his thoughts.

He forgot their closeness a moment as he readjusted. Their legs briefly entangled and off-hand, he pushed a hand against her dressed belly for momentary purchase. Cloth clung to her skin. He noted the contour of her navel. Despite the cyan tide that washed out colour, he couldn't easily conceal the blush now broad and hot across his cheeks. But... Rather than caught in shame, the lad smiled. Smiled, leaned forward to nuzzle, and helped carry upwards to where a fresh breath of air waited. He was first to breach, throwing back his unkempt hairline.

"I had forgot you were so graceful," He said over the soft roar of wave-swell catching at their backs.

 

[Rosa Gunn]

Rosa had lost herself in the moment beneath the waves, the feel of his hands beneath hers, the rush of colour in his cheeks as they entangled briefly and his hands found purchase on her. She pulled herself closer as he nuzzled her, her racing heart and the time without oxygen further increasing the effects of her giddiness. Rosa tilted her head back as the reached the surface, allowing the water to move her hair out of her face as she drew in the sweet air that awaited them. A joyful laugh escaping her as she blushed slightly at Seroth's words. Smiling, she gently looped her arms around his neck, their legs brushing gently as they each sought to keep their heads above the surface. "You're incredibly nimble yourself, Mister Ur-Rahn." she replied.

Her smile flickered, their closeness making her tremble slightly. "Seroth," she said softly, pressing her forehead against, his, her heart still hammering in her chest as she sought for the right words. "I..." The words to convey her sorrow for hurting him on Moreau Station, to explain that she hadn't been ready then...but the words failed her. Instead she opened herself completely in the force, allowed him to see that whatever conflict had been before was gone. Brown eyes sought purchase on grey ones, her soul bared naked for him to see.

 

[Seydon of Arda]

Their feet touched to a low bar of fine sand a score of yards out from the shallower portions of the shore. Seroth was glad for it. The sudden empathetic sensation that ran roughshod through his blunt mental scape nearly blacked out his senses, such was the onrush of empowered emotion. It was Rosa Mazhar, in overwhelming essence. Vestiges of emotional conflict: fear, anger, envy, hope, loathing, and a gamut of pain. It was everything he wished to hear and know, though physical communication lacked in enunciating the immense, emotional complexity. Rosa had been hurt, then healed. Scared, then comfort. Doubting, but then vindicated. Had he been responsible for that, any of it? He hoped so, at least partially... And now there was a ball of light and warmth that coalesced in his chest. Wafting from her tendrils of Force connection. A nameless, universal sensation...

He gripped one arm 'round her waist and paddled further up the shore bar. 'Till the water lapped down at their knees and they stood easily against an under-toe bed of loose pebble grains. The boy clutched the woman close and eased one hand down, cupping her drenched thighs. Easily, he lifted and sat her belly high against his midriff. Sunlight fell through the parts of her wet, clumped hair. They stood immobile for a moment, though time slowed so every sensation dragged out into seemingly eternal minutes. Seroth smiled, in his soft, unassuming manner. "I... I know... I think I should have kissed you again, too..."

 

[Rosa Gunn]

A small gasp of surprise escaped her as he lifted her. She coiled her legs about him and held herself fast a playful smile on her face before he spoke. Her eyes dropped for a moment and she shook her head gently, droplets of water flicking from her hair to splash his face as she did. "No..." she said meeting his eyes once more "No, you were right to walk away when you did..." A hand reached down to brush a strand of hair from his forehead, moving it carefully back so it wouldn't fall down again, her hands trembling as she did.

Soft lips, pressed against his forehead as her hands moved to cup his face, her nose brushing softly down his as she moved so their eyes were level. "That was then." she said softly, one hand moving from his face and down his neck, her lips gently brushing his. "This is now. If I walked away, the force would lead me straight back to you. You kick started the healing process, I was just to blind to see it." She kissed him gently.

 

[Seydon of Arda]

"I only sai - Wait - I only...~" She quieted his habitual meekness, with a soft kiss that woke the boldness in his arms.

Unabashedly, his hands reached to press and stroke, running over the lines of her dressed backside. One hand rested, stroking the soft of her nape. The other fell and clenched to the meat of her waist, kneading against the soft dimple of the small of her back. Seroth held no particular favourites in appreciating a woman's form. His youth brought inexperience, a lack of taste and romantic tact. Often enough, the idea of intimacy just brought a tired chuckle. The lanes between stars were long, lonely, broken up with interspersed spikes of quest and violence. Most nights, he rolled into his bedding, laced with cooling sweat from a long day's exertion. He didn't need kisses: he needed sleep.

With Rosa, he felt a hint that he would be lacking his usual resting hours. The lad didn't mind... Gods knew Rosa and he had their needs, though he felt himself... shiver. Monsters, beasts, and belligerents with vibroswords and heavy repeaters didn't faze his sense of courage. ...Tending to a woman, Rosa Mazhar out of the entirety of the fairer, stronger sex, suddenly brought him to a sensation of depth. ...Specifically, that he was out of his.

They parted from the kiss, just briefly. Seroth licked at his teeth. Watched the sun play with brilliant motes behind Rosa's brown eyes. His hand crossed down her nape, to her throat and jaw, and tugged her close again. This instance, he took up the initiative, completing a far more intense kiss. And hoped the scalding sensation of his tongue dipping across her own was something women appreciated…

 

[Rosa Gunn]

As his tongue swept across hers a shiver of pleasure ran through her igniting a fire of passion that swept through her body and she responded in turn, her arms coiling round his neck, returning his ardent kiss. She absorbed and projected the emotions that flitted between them filling the force with her empathy, unchecked. She had nothing to fear, but she could feel the nerves from Seroth and a smile tugged at the corners of her mouth as they parted once more.

Unwrapping her legs she slid gracefully back to the sand bank beneath their feet, the waves brushing her bare legs as she looked up at Seroth's eyes, the sun highlighting the hues of blue and silver in them. Slipping her arms about his waist she moved in close, resting her head on his shoulder a sigh of happiness leaving her lips as she did. She closed her eyes and enjoyed the moment, the drumming of his own heart close to hers, the gentle rise and fall of his chest, and the security he offered as he wrapped his own arms around her. The warm sun was already beginning to dry them and she opened her eyes, catching sight of a dark line on the horizon.

"A storm is coming." she said softly lifting her head off his shoulder frowning slightly as an dark feeling washed over her. She pushed it roughly aside and smiled up at Seroth. "Race you back to the beach." she said her eyes flashing playfully as she kissed him lightly once more then placed her hands on his chest, pushing him, hopefully hard enough to fall into the water before running from the sand bank and diving into the water once more.

 

[Seydon of Arda]

Halfway dry, the lad simply sighed aloud, grinned upwards at an unblemished sky, and let Rosa's pushing force him off the hard callouses of his heels. The sea took him, doused him in salty, cyan brine, before he pushed up off the close shore sands under his hands. Thoroughly soaked, once more, the boy shook his head and blew mists of moisture out from his nostrils, giving a false cry. Rosa was already fast swimming and running up the lessening tide drifts by the beach heads. Seroth didn't know he was grinning quite so broadly. The boy drove forward and jumped, propelled by a slight Force enhancement, arcing powerfully and cutting into the shallow waters like a knife.

Distant, rough peals of tropical thunder sounded as he breached, less than a meter behind fleeing Rosa. His hands dipped and caught palm-fulls of warm water, dousing her backside with repeated lathers and listening to her shrieks, ducking beneath blind, flailing strikes. He paused to glance, looking over his naked shoulder. The far dark line to the west had grown a mote thicker. Gentle breezes caressing over the wave curls and tickling tall palm fronds whipped up a mile faster. The storm seemed to be facing an eternity 'fore it caught up with their tiny, stationary island. But the lad stopped and snorted water from his nose, taking a moment to just sniff. He lacked Master Mazhar's pure talent with empathetic abilities, but his instinctual reckonings with nature very rarely failed him. An hour... Maybe more, perhaps less, and then the storm would be here.

And it would be angry.

"It is not the storm you should be worried for, Miss Rosa..." He called after her.

It was just enough to part her attention. The lad charged up the shore as they left the waters, lifting Rosa from her feet with an arm beneath her back and knees. He could only grin, ignoring her cry of indignation. Another thunderous exchange barked behind them, the storm line now a heavy, brooding bar flashing with sheet lightning on the horizon. Rather than put Rosa up for suffering with his vessels utilitarian features, he scampered up the hot sand towards her more luxurious vessel berthed beside his own. It felt... like a kind of perfect juxtaposition: form and beauty mixed with modest function next to basic bareness and ragged usage. Warm glow globes laced them with drying glows of light, as he took them up the entry ramp.

"We should not be outside when the storm comes to greet us," He said. "And I am glad to see your face not so drawn by water..."

He laid her back down to her water-scrunched toes, carefully running a thumb-pad across her cheekbone. "You are a glad creature, when happiness finds you. Did I not tell you, Rosa? The Force is with you. It gave back my favourite smile in the galaxy..."

 

[Rosa Gunn]

She let her head fall to his shoulder giving up her protest about being swept off her feet. She glowed with joy, not only in the force but in herself. Her cheeks were flushed and her eyes bright as he carried her up the ramp of the Golden Rose. The idea of being outside when the storm hit them was an exciting prospect, to be able to feel the natural power of it as it raged around her them. Perhaps she could change his mind about that decision when it found them. The bulkhead was cold beneath her wet toes as he set her down and she winced slightly.

She caught his hand as he brushed her cheek, interlocking their fingers. "No, Seroth. The force did not give me my smile back, it guided me to the person who could grant me that happiness again. You brought your favourite smile back." She kissed him again, not with the softness that she had before, but with a fiery passion pulling him deeper into the ship as she did. One might have advised caution, or for the two of them to take things slowly, but Rosa knew that this was where she was supposed to be. This was who she was supposed to be with.

 

[Seydon of Arda]

Thunder cracked open the sky at an hour past midnight, waking a young man from a crazed dream. Seroth gripped his hands to partially torn bedding, still warm with sweat and clinging to his bare frame. Stilling, tuning to the thunderclaps boisterously drumming off-tempo outside, he ran his senses through a swift 'calm': breath slowed, his thoughts emptying into a cool lake of glistening awareness. The tremble in his wrists ceased, lessening the threat of waking the company lying blissfully by his side. The lad blinked, and wiped a tired palm over his eyes.

The sheets were partially demolished. Clawed dents ran down portions of the wroshyr-planked headboard. Bite marks had torn through the stuffing of one pillow that had been displaced across deep in a shadow across the broad bedroom. Lightning ghosted through a shaded porthole, illustrating phantoms upon the pastel walls. Briefly, the lad swore he observed a pair of contorting shadows buckling in torrid motion. He swung his legs over, extracting from a tangle of silken, viridian blankets. Naked toes pawed into velvet carpeting, warmed below by heat-plates conducting comfortable temperature from the engine quarters.

Seroth paused, and leaned to drape himself carefully over a prone figure. His hand found her hip, his lips against her cheek, and he kissed lightly if damply. "Hmmmnn..."

He rose to unsteady feet, making shaky headway towards the galley. Down a short ramp, riding a brief turbolift down six decks, and partially limping into a spacious dining lounge. The boy didn't prescribe to caffeinated beverages but he deduced the presence of a MR[CAF] 9000 meant Rosa had a more refined edge. Soon, a broad-dish cup was percolating with a caramel mixture of fine-ground coffee soused with liberal pitches of cream and sugar. Idly, he scratched something that had scabbed over his naked rump during his passed out sleep: a trio of long, drawn cut lines curiously molded to the shape of manicured nails.

"...'Luminous beings are we'," Seroth quoted to himself, chuckling softly. "'Not this crude matter.' Heh..."

 

[Rosa Gunn]

Rosa smiled as he stirred and left a kiss on her cheek. She lay still for a few minutes listening to the raging storm without. Its noise and power had been drowned out by her and Seroth. She was tingling from head to foot warmth spreading throughout her insides. Stretching with a small squeak she slipped her feet of the side of the bed onto the cold floor and cast a glance over the state of the bed. "Lights." she said softly. The ship responded instantly blinding her for a moment. "Dim!" she said shielding her eyes "Stars. Lights dim!" Slowly the light lessened to a more bearable level. With better light she could see the carnage the two of them had left. She bit her bottom, lip chuckling to herself before rising and picking her way carefully across the room to her dresser.

Her reflection showed a mess of hair, a bite mark on her neck and one or two fingerprint bruises on her arms. She ran her fingers through her hair, making herself more presentable and found herself a silk nightdress as the smell of caff drifted up to greet her. pulling it on as she left the room her barefeet made no noise as she moved through her ship, fingers trailing idly along the walls. She paused in the galley doorway, leaning against it for a moment she watched him, eyes tracing the defined edges of his body. Moving into the room, she slipped her arms around his waist, resting her cheek on his back. "I think we did more damage, than the storm ever would." she said softly.