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“If you were a waiting room, I would never see a doctor
I would sit there with my first aid kit and bleed”
How could she not love Michael? Michael with her perfect professional calm and unabashed smile. Michael with her elusive but addictive laugh and witty remarks. Michael with her brilliant beyond brilliant mind and her selfless heart. Michael was her roommate and best and closest friend.
But waiting on Michael felt like waiting for a miracle. She was always diving headfirst into battle, looking at the impossible and responding with “try me”. It made Michael, Michael but waiting on her when she was fully submerged in the fight was near impossible too. Tilly had learned quickly that the only way to remain in Michael’s world during those battles was to dive in with her. You had to join Michael in her impossible world if you wanted to be anywhere near her, otherwise, you’d be waiting for forever.
“Tilly, you can’t be serious?” Joann questioned as Keyla and Airiam looked at Tilly with their own versions of shock.
“I’m dead serious.” Tilly was not fucking around. She knew what she wanted and what she needed to do.
Airiam read the stony seriousness on Tilly’s face, “Commander Burnham might choose to do something dangerous but that does not mean you have to follow her on that path.”
“This isn’t about Michael,” Tilly shot back.
“Oh, this is clearly about Michael,” Keyla cut in, “if it's not then why, Tilly? Why would you do that?”
“It’s the right thing to do. It’s brave, it’s what Starfleet does.” Tilly looked between her three friends, “I have to do it, ok?”
“That doesn’t seem like the most mentally sound reason,” Joann said gently, reaching out to squeeze Tilly’s shoulder.
“Well, it’s the only reason I have that makes any sense.”
“Do you have other reasons? They might seem incomprehensible to you but our input could help you find the answer.” Airiam probed in a way that could only come off as caring when it came from her.
“None that would help me in this argument.”
“So it is about Michael,” Keyla said with an edge of ‘I told you so’.
With all eyes on her, Tilly lets out a frustrated breath throwing her arms up, “yes, ok! All the reasons I have come back to Michael. It always comes back to Michael.”
“Ok,” Joann practically whispers, “Is that something you’re comfortable with?”
“Yes, no, I mean I think I am,” Tilly’s exasperation with herself is on full display. “I don’t give it a lot of thought. How can I? How can I contemplate my feelings for my best friend when we were in the middle of a war and now we’re on this impossible mission that doesn’t make any sense half the time. And Michael, I mean she’s got so much going on. Her brother, the signals themselves, and even the little stuff she tells me, it's all so much. So I have to do this, I have to help. I don’t know what else I would do. I don’t know if I could do anything else.”
The three friends shared a look. Tilly was going to do anything for Michael and it was becoming clear that none of them would likely be able to stop her.
“Alright, I can’t say I’m a fan of all of that but I’m,” Kelya paused for just a second looking between Airiam and Joann, each of them confirming her thought. “We’re here for you. And if doing this, as crazy as it is, is what you feel like you have to do, we'll be here.”
“Thank you,” Tilly let out.
“I’m still going to try to talk you out of it,” Joann jokingly added, “not right now but I’m not dropping this, not yet.”
“Fair,” Tilly was smiling again. It seemed that the choices she was planning to make were not the problem. What she really needed was to tell someone what she was thinking. So while Tilly was drifting toward acting on less than great ideas, she hadn’t gotten there yet. Her friends had gotten those pesky thoughts out of her before they had become full-scale love drunk impulsive actions. But that didn’t mean Tilly wasn’t close to the impossible, close to watching Michael fall off a cliff that had nothing at the bottom and jumping right after her.
Tilly was coming to realize that she’d do anything, go anywhere for Michael. She had. She had gone beyond time and space for Michael. She loved her so much she’d do anything for her. She’d solve the mysteries of the universe, pull the stars out of the sky, break the laws of physics, and even take a phaser blast to the chest. She knew this. It was Tilly’s truth every time she looked at Michael and god forbid Michael were to look back at her. In those moments, whether it be Michael giving her that signature cock of her eyebrow, a brilliant smile, or simply a knowing look, all of them made Tilly forget everything else besides Michael. There was only the moment, nothing more, just Michael and the way she looked at Tilly. She loved Michael with everything she had.
—————
“ I want to be the power ballad that lifts you up and holds you down”
They had shared a lot, it might even be impossible for Tilly to describe the entirety of their friendship. The first time Tilly held Michael when she cried felt like a defining moment. For once Tilly was being the strong one, she was the comforting presence, she was taking on the burden that was weighing on Michael, even if it was only a small part of her overall pain. Tilly had walked in on her crying.
“I can go,” she had said halfway into their room.
“No, you’re fine. I need to stop.” Michael had begun to dry her eyes and straighten her back. This had happened before. Moments where Tilly had interrupted Michael crying or even just having an emotional moment privately. But this time felt different to Tilly.
“No, no, no you don’t,” Tilly said as she sat down on the edge of Michael’s bed, “I am a feeler of feelings. We feel our feelings in these quarters and if you need to cry more you can and I really think you should.”
Michael looked at Tilly as if she were an equation to solve before she hiccuped and again the tears began to fall.
Tilly thought about getting up to leave. Michael was a private person after all, but there she was right in front of Tilly, crying her eyes out. So instead Tilly scooted onto the bed a bit more and held out her arms as if saying I’m here for you.
And for whatever reason Michael melted into the embrace, she cried into Tilly’s shoulder for some unknown amount of time. The two of them there, Tilly still in uniform, Michael dressed to work out, cradling each other on that single birth bed.
Tilly wasn’t great at being there for others. She hadn’t had much experience with friends and her family was mostly just a mess. But being there with Michael at that moment made her want to change. She wanted to be Michael’s rock. She wanted to be the person Michael knew she could turn to whether it be professional or personal or anywhere in between. Once it was happening Tilly knew she would always want to be the shoulder Michael cried on. She wanted to be everything for Michael.
—————
“ And when broken bodies are washed ashore
Who am I to ask for more, more, more?”
Michael was everywhere and nowhere to Tilly. She was so busy all the time, the demands their life put on Michael meant that she always had something she could be doing. And Michael being Michael always went running to help. How could she not?
They had found themselves in a future that was so broken compared to the present they had left behind and Michael had spent a year living in it without them. She had seen firsthand this new reality they would have to call home, saw what needed to be fixed, saw the pain and suffering of people, so of course, she was busy. She had planets, people, and at times a whole universe to save. They had come so far and yet the truth that seemed to endlessly guide Michael remained the same; Michael would do anything and everything to help and fix the problems no one else would.
It didn’t help Tilly that the more she wanted out of her friendship with Michael the more guilt she felt. Who was she to desire more out of Michael? To crave more time with her? Michael was the Captain and god did she wear it well, but she was Tilly’s Captain. She had a crew to guide, look after, and all those worlds just outside their door to consider too. Tilly had to remind herself that being Michael’s friend meant only being in her orbit.
There was protocol too to consider. Discovery was closer than almost any starship crew, how could they not? But there were still protocols, regulations, and rules to think about. Captains could be friends with their crew but they had to stay just a little bit further away. A First Officer could be right in the thick of it with the officers and crew, they were expected to. First Officers were meant to be the bridge in-between the crew and the Captain with the Captain being just a little too far off to do the same. Michael had to do that too now. If she stayed too close it would be impossible to make those difficult choices Captains so often had to make. Those moments when it would be way too painful to think of your crew as anything other than that. So when Tilly looked at her Captain she had to remind herself that Michael was just that, her Captain. It was painful to bear that distance, to not see her every night, to be far away. Michael was still her best friend, Tilly thought at times that they could leave each other’s lives for good and she’d always think of Michael as her best friend, maybe the only true one in her life. But duty came before friendship, before love, before everything so who was Tilly to want after the spark in Michael’s eyes, her presence, and smile? To long for intimate moments of friendship and love that Michael had so few to give? To yearn for the essence of her happiness and joy in her life? Tilly had no right.
They were friends, really good friends even after everything, but that did not mean Tilly had a right to Michael. No one did except Michael herself. So as she watched her best friend work from across the bridge Tilly could not help but yearn for more.
But there were planets to help, people to save, and a Federation to rebuild. Who was Tilly compared to all that?
—————
“Want to make you fall in love as hard as my poor parent's teenage daughter”
Michael deserved love. She deserved to be loved in a meaningful, deep, all-consuming way. Michael deserved that and so much more, at least Tilly thought she did. Tilly thought that Michael deserved anything her heart desired, any star in the galaxy.
When Tilly fell for someone she tended to crash land. Sure she could sleep with someone, flirt with them for the night, no problem. She’d have a great time, or sometimes a less than a great time, and walk away without a second thought. She did it all the time, less so when on duty but still enough for it to be a habit. But falling for someone, was different.
Tilly had only had a handful of crushes in her life, never mind relationships. In fact, she had only had one and it had failed spectacularly during her second year at the academy. And since then she had been on Discovery, and for all the stars in the universe, Tilly could not figure out why the next crash landing had to be Michael Burnham.
Tilly worked hard to keep her feelings to herself but they were right there under the surface. It hadn’t taken much for Michael to wiggle her way into Tilly’s heart and for Tilly to want her to stay there. Falling for Michael happened all at once and then over and over again. They were close as roommates, friends, and crewmates. They spent a lot of time together and knew a lot about each other but still, there would be stretches of time when they couldn’t see each other in a meaningful way, couldn’t share a meal, or train together. In those stretches of time, when she and Michael felt more like ships passing in the night than friends, her crush would lessen just a bit. Her feelings would slink away to the far reaches of her mind. But of course, Michael would do something and Tilly would crash into her feelings again.
Sometimes she wondered if Michael knew. If she had somehow figured out that Tilly had a heart-stopping, mind-melting crush. Like when they agreed to continue being roommates even
though Michael was entitled to a very nice senior officer's cabin.
The conversation itself was a simple exchange. Once Michael had been promoted Tilly asked when she’d be moving out. Michael had looked at her like she was crazy simply stating, “I won’t be.”
Then after a moment added, “unless you would like me to move to different quarters.”
“No, of course not,” was Tilly’s automatic response. She couldn’t think of anything worse.
That was the entire exchange. But Tilly had then spent the next three days walking around the ship with an extra-wide smile and sense of joy that could not go away. She felt like she was a teenager again when her crush had said more than three words to her in physics class. She felt so smitten that she had to spend hours actively reminding herself that Michael’s want to be roommates had nothing to do with Tilly’s little crush. But no matter what she did, work, running, sparing, playing Kadish knot, eating a meal, shifts on the bridge, or anything else for that matter, her mind would settle back on Michael. Her heart was so young and it was determined to love Michael Burnham.
—————
“I want to make you drive all night
Just because I said maybe you should come over”
Tilly thought a lot about being taken into the mycelial network by May. How she was terrified, how she wanted to fix things so bad, how she felt everything all at once the entire time she was there. She thought more than once during her time there that she’d die in the network. That she’d never leave, never see the world she loved again, the people she loved either.
But then Michael came. The way Michael always seemed to. She was just there, doing the impossible. And when she asked Tilly if she was real, if Tilly was real, Tilly might have broken right there and then if they hadn’t been in an impossible situation. And then Michael was hugging her so hard and tight like she didn’t really believe Tilly’s words.
“Thank you for coming to get me.”
“ Always. ”
Remembering that one word. How one word was said at the right time in the right way had been more meaningful than any speech or long-winded response. Fuck! No wonder everyone loved Michael. It was so easy to love Michael when she was simply, wonderfully, impossibly herself. Always, she had said, as if it was the only possible answer. As if Tilly was worth something even close to always. If they hadn’t been in an impossible situation, if Tilly had more in her, she might have kissed Michael right then and there.
But there were worlds to save and a ship full of the crew to get back to. Tilly hadn’t kissed her. Tilly was never able to act like that. She was never brave enough. Michael had said the word always, and Tilly was terrified. She wasn’t worth such devotion and commitment even if it was only as a friend. She had never had a friend like Michael. She had never had anyone like Michael Burnham.
And even in all the ways, Tilly had Michael she still wanted more. She wanted that “always” to be true. She wanted to believe in that “always” with everything she had. But “always” can’t last forever. Tilly knows she did things to mess up that “always” too. She let Michael sacrifice herself as “the red angel”. She didn’t say a word, she didn’t argue or try to convince Michael that it was a stupid idea. Not because it was bad, it was a brilliant selfless idea and if someone had to save all of creation, of course, it would be Michael Burnham. No, it was stupid because why did it always have to be Michael? Tilly couldn’t stand it. She couldn’t stand seeing the woman she loved so much be self-sacrificing to a fault. But how could she admit something so selfish to the face of a woman always looking to save everyone but herself? How could Tilly stand before Michael and say don’t do it? Don’t do it because I want you here, because I want you to be safe, because I said don’t. All sentient life for all of time was on the line and the only argument against the plan Tilly could come up with was don’t do it for me.
How insane, Tilly thought, that she could be worth an “always”.
—————
“And I can wish all that I want, but it won't bring us together”
Leaving Discovery was the hardest thing she’d ever done in her life. Not because she was leaving everything she had worked for behind. She had fast-tracked her life in Starfleet, worked impossibly hard to be accepted early and be the best, the top of her class. She wasn’t even close to 30 and if she kept going at this rate she’d be a captain before she knew it. (Or maybe she wouldn’t. She couldn’t imagine serving on any ship other than Discovery. It was the only ship she knew.) She had done amazing things, been to amazing places and impossible times, and she had met amazing people.
She had met Michael. She had gone into the future for her. Leaping into the unknown for her best friend, the love of her life, and no she didn’t do it alone but she would have in a heartbeat. But now all the things she had done didn’t seem to matter. She was a Lieutenant but she had worked for it for all the wrong reasons. Her heart wasn’t in it and probably never had been. Fuck, she was still young and realizing that every choice she had made in her life was either a strange attempt at getting her mother’s approval or due to Michael Burnham.
She had to leave. The universe was a totally new place and she needed to set herself free or else she might live her entire life staring at Michael and hoping for a miracle.
Leaving Discovery wasn’t easy because it meant leaving home. Leaving the home she had built for herself as well as the one she had found. But she couldn’t look back, if she looked back and saw her crew, her friends, her Michael watching her leave, Tilly would never get off that ship ever again.
“I know it’s for the better”