He doesn't track how long he holds her in complete stillness, unbroken by breath or heartbeat. There's odd comfort in it, knowing no march of mortality will ever come for her again save by mishap or murder. Eventually, he opens his eyes to find the unchanging street lighting of the Down still bathing the otherwise dark room in a lurid yellow-ish glow, creating harsh shadows.
"At some point I stopped seeing the trees for the forest," he says softly, speaking into her hair against his nose, lips, and chin. "I told myself my concern for humanity kept me human enough, that the great work to which I'd devoted my nights was all I needed. To try to save us all, as our world was potentially falling into disaster."
His hand takes up stroking again, a caress of thumb back and forth over her shoulder, the other arm lower and wrapped around her folded in legs and hip. "I thought my hardness was strength. But hard things are brittle things. They crack easily with the right sort of blow."
It has been a bitter pill to swallow, one he's still trying to come to terms with. "Nothing in my world prepared me for this one. For all of you. The weight of your humanity. The strength of raw need in this place, hooking into me and tearing a jagged hole. All it took was one person with a foot in the door, and I..." He sighs an unneeded breath.
"I can't close the door anymore. I can't find that detachment and cold logic that kept everything ordered. Neat. Clean. I don't know how to feel about that. Or even what, if anything, it has to do with Crais. It's where my thoughts are now, chasing one another stupidly like an animal its tail."
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"At some point I stopped seeing the trees for the forest," he says softly, speaking into her hair against his nose, lips, and chin. "I told myself my concern for humanity kept me human enough, that the great work to which I'd devoted my nights was all I needed. To try to save us all, as our world was potentially falling into disaster."
His hand takes up stroking again, a caress of thumb back and forth over her shoulder, the other arm lower and wrapped around her folded in legs and hip. "I thought my hardness was strength. But hard things are brittle things. They crack easily with the right sort of blow."
It has been a bitter pill to swallow, one he's still trying to come to terms with. "Nothing in my world prepared me for this one. For all of you. The weight of your humanity. The strength of raw need in this place, hooking into me and tearing a jagged hole. All it took was one person with a foot in the door, and I..." He sighs an unneeded breath.
"I can't close the door anymore. I can't find that detachment and cold logic that kept everything ordered. Neat. Clean. I don't know how to feel about that. Or even what, if anything, it has to do with Crais. It's where my thoughts are now, chasing one another stupidly like an animal its tail."