[Dejah's room]

[2goodarms]

Time passes. Asleep, half-dazed by the Voice of Barsoom, Curtis has even less sense of how long he stays in Dejah's bed.

(In his dreams, everything's warm and bright, even the smallest spaces of the train; nothing aches, and voices ring all around him.)

When he finally wakes up, utter disorientation smacks into him headlong -- where am I? what the fuck am I sleeping on? -- before he feels the warm body next to him and, like a compass swinging north, reorients around the soft sound of Dejah's breath. Sleep took care of the last side effects: he feels completely steady, awake, his calm returning as he looks over at Dejah.

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[dejah_thoris]

She shifts with him, working on the old knots, the old tensions. They feel like stones under his skin. It's all right, she has strong hands.

"They would be beautiful," she insists. "Your stories are painful, horrific even. But they are yours and they are beautiful. Without them, you would never have found your way -- to me." Her words are barely more than a breath, shimmering with that same bright thread of hope.

[2goodarms]

Curtis lapses back into silence; his hold on her tightens the smallest amount.

"The scar's enough," he says at last. "My arm's enough. Maybe I would've gotten here anyway, I don't know."

[dejah_thoris]

Her hand at the nape of his neck melts and she hugs him, the grip unambiguous. She presses her cheek against the top of his head. Her heart feels like it's caught in the back of her throat. They're not over. They're not done. It's just another battle to fight. And she knew that was going to be the case when she took this path.

"Forgive me. I can't help but imagine what you would look like if you decided you loved Barsoom and wanted to embrace our ways. You are beautiful to my eyes, scars and all, regardless of whether or not you ever set foot there."

He wouldn't even need the Voice of Barsoom to hear the sorrow and grim determination warring in her voice. That silver thread is so tiny, but she refuses to let go of it.

[2goodarms]

It's enough to twist his heart an extra inch.

"Hey." Curtis turns his head just enough to drop a light kiss on her throat. "It's okay."

He's still going to visit -- assuming she's still willing, after he tells her everything. Maybe he'll want to stay. Maybe, given enough time, he'll be able to make that final leap, and fulfill the other desire twining through Dejah's voice.

And even if he doesn't...

He can't let himself put it to words yet, but she can hear it, and feel it. The deep fondness reflected back at her. The growing devotion.

[dejah_thoris]

She can feel it now; it's not just her imagination. It's palpable in his voice and it gives her hope. A part of her knows she's being a damned fool. She's lived five centuries and managed to only get romantically entangled once before. She's always had her work; the Academy, Helium, the war, all of it consumed everything she had to give. And John.

Is that what this is? Has having Curtis so close opened old wounds? Spilling memories of happier times like so much fresh blue blood? No. No, certainly it echoes those times, but it is different. New. Precious and rare.

She shakes her head, her grip not lessening a bit. "It's not okay, but that's all right. It will be. I promised you, I want us to be happy, and we may not always be. But I will always work to bring us back there. You have my word on that, Curtis Everett."

Another complex storm of emotion washes over him, and amid the darker emotions, hope and love shine through like the moons of Barsoom. Full and bright, shedding holy light on the shadow, driving it back. There is no war she has fought that she has not won. No love that she has declared that has gone unrequited. She is Dejah Thoris, and she will not bow her head in defeat.

[2goodarms]

And like the first time he saw sunlight in eighteen years, a part of Curtis wants to rear back and shield himself: I don't deserve this.

It's not a question of deserving or not-deserving, though, or whether some tail-section hick has a right to something from the Front. He's off the train. He wants this. He can have it; she's offering it freely. Her ferocity and determination warm him just as much as the love and hope.

If Dejah bringing him back to happiness has any kind of catch...he'll willingly take it upon himself.

What they're building is worth it.

He pulls back enough to settle both hands on her hair, gazing into her eyes, feeling the truth of her words -- and then he kisses her, full and warm.

[dejah_thoris]

That shared gaze communicates more than any soliloquy ever could. She returns that kiss, gentle and sure. She remembers not the first time they kissed, but the second. Where he kissed her and it felt like the first time he was opening to the possibilities. If he truly wants this, if he can find it in him to trust her, then she knows whatever the darkness holds, they will face it together.

She sinks into the lush softness of his kiss, telling him in this quiet way how good he feels, how much better her life is with him in it. She will never get tired of telling him that, and it shows, in her breath and in her hands. In the way her body molds to his.

Tomorrow they will walk into the desert together. They will face whatever comes, together.