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It takes a while for both Isaac and Ellie to notice that anything’s changed- aside from the crippling trauma and numerous scars on both of their bodies. They’re too busy getting their lives back together, too busy finding a place to live in and settle in and too busy trying to navigate a new relationship.
Only once they finally have the time to get to bed at the same time, they notice it.
The trickle of awareness at the back of their heads, an awareness that’s not their own.
“Don’t be so sad,” Isaac murmurs, right at the moment as Ellie says:
“You are so tired.”
They’re lying on their sides in their occasionally shared bed, close enough to touch but far enough that it’s not suffocating.
Ellie’s eyes are very dark in the dim bedroom. Isaac’s mouth never quite learned how to smile again.
“I’m not sad,” Ellie says but her voice hitches. But she is. She had been for a while now. She stares at Isaac. Isaac stares back. He brushes her bare arm with careful fingertips. He feels a shudder run through him at that.
Wait… what is this? Is it a remnant of the Marker’s influence on both of them, some leftover from outer space?
“I can feel you,” he says. He frowns. Brushes her arm again. His own skin rises to goosebumps.
“What do you mean?” She says and inches closer. Her breath is warm. As is the palm she raises to his cheek.
They shiver in unison.
“You are sad,” Isaac whispers. “I can feel it.” His own melancholia is long faded to the background, drowned by the noise of his trauma.
“So are you,” Ellie whispers back. “How is this- how can I feel it?” She keeps stroking his cheek.
He keeps stroking her arm. “I don’t know.” He squeezes his eyes closed. Her melancholia hums within him too, her care for him making the ever-present cold a little less so.
She squeezes her eyes closed and takes his hand between hers. His pain hums within her, his care for her making her sigh deeply and snuggle a little closer.