Chapter Text
It was Paul who found Pyrrha with her forearm braced on the airlock door, her forehead pressed to the plex, staring out into nothing. Her other palm rested on the control panel, thin smoke curling up from a cigarette between her fingers. A slight turn of her head told Paul she heard them approach. Neither one of them spoke immediately.
Paul was content to hold their silence until Pyrrha broke it with, “Are you going to tell me smoking’s a useless habit?” Her muddy eyes slid over to them and she added, “If you tell me you’re not them, I’m going to kick you out of this airlock. I’ve done it before.”
“I’m not them,” said Paul, who picked their moments. Pyrrha grunted. “Your choices are your own, Pyrrha.” They might have been talking about smoking.
“That’s the problem, isn’t it?” Pyrrha asked, turning her attention back to the window. Paul could feel something rising in her, so they waited. Eventually, Pyrrha asked the plex, “Do you know how many people on this station aren’t them?”
It was probably rhetorical but Paul answered anyway. “Four, at the moment.”
Calloused fingers drummed on the plex. “You’re counting me in that,” said Pyrrha.
“Unless my memory is very unreliable,” said Paul, whose memory had never been less than utterly reliable, “you weren’t piloting that body full-time until fairly recently yourself.”
With an explosive sigh, Pyrrha pushed off the plex so she could examine her hands. "Harrow isn't the only one who sees ghosts," she said. "Sometimes I expect to see my hands moving when I look down. It feels… strange to move them myself." Tendons bunched as she rotated her wrists, flexing into fists. When she put her cigarette out on the back of her hand it was with a steady unflinching motion.
Paul regarded her with the same fondness they always did. Camilla had trusted and respected her. Palamedes had been her colleague, had both wanted her protection and wanted to protect her. Paul felt all of those things and a few of their own. There was, they thought, a terrible loneliness in being one where there had been two.
"Sometimes I forget I'm not taller," they told her. "Last laundry day I put half my clothes away too high to reach." It wasn't the same thing, but they were mostly aiming for the chuckle that now rumbled in Pyrrha's chest.
"Just call me. I'll come get your pants for you. That wouldn't be the first time, either," Pyrrha said. Her eyes were still shadowed, but at least she was smiling. "God, you remember how much of a struggle it was getting Nona dressed? At least you can put your own shirt on."
"Most of the time," answered Paul gravely. "My arms are shorter than half of me expects. I'll let you know if I need help." They felt their body shift toward Pyrrha. Their body was constantly in motion, but this felt much more directed than their usual weight shifts. Before they could parse that out they settled both feet firmly on the floor.
"Mm, please do." Pyrrha only met Paul's eyes for a moment, but she was clearly looking for something. Whether she saw it or not, Paul didn't know. Not for the first time, Paul wished they could peel her open and look at the whole of her. The glimpses they saw let them know it would be breathtaking.
They saw her expression smooth back into bland, wry good humor, and they fought to keep her open to them just a crack. “Gideon’s started calling me Calamities,” they said, trying and failing to sound displeased. Pyrrha’s lips quirked back up, and Paul’s heart beat hard, twice.
“I can see it,” said Pyrrha. “Better than Sex Paul, mm?” There was a slight undercurrent to her question. Paul hoped they weren’t imagining it.
“Honestly I’m just surprised Gideon knew the word,” answered Paul. “It has four syllables.” The relentlessly cherful ginger had been so proud when she came up with it. Get it? Cam plus Palamedes, and you are a disaster, Paul.
Pyrrha’s bark of laughter was everything Paul had wanted. “That’s Gideon,” Pyrrha agreed. “That kid is damnably sweet. And about as smart as two rocks.”
“Gideon does seem to keep all her brain cells in her biceps,” said Paul. “But she falls into the right thing to do most of the time. And she and Harrow are good for each other.” The moment they brought up the couple they knew they’d said, if not the wrong thing, then not exactly the right one either. Pyrrha was studying her hands again, though Paul guessed she wasn't really seeing them.
When she spoke her voice was smooth and careful. "You know when I… when Camilla and I…" Her pause seemed considering rather than uncertain. "I know it was only because she was lonely. And I never, with Palamedes."
Paul had never been one to take risks. Camilla and Palamedes had never done a single thing without weighing every possible outcome, often past the limit of Camilla's patience. Paul had inherited caution from both of them.
Paul took the first risk of their life and rested their hand on Pyrrha's wrist. "I am not them," they reminded her, and the emphasis was subtle but distinct.
Pyrrha made as though to pull away, but only slipped her hand back enough to fit into Paul's. Her hard grip told Paul everything that her voice didn't when she scoffed, "Oh, what do you want with an old woman like me." Paul sensed again that she wasn't done.
Sure enough, the comforting void of space drew her eyes again before she said, "God is dead. Wake detonated, blast her stubborn pride. Nona, Alecto, whichever or both… she’s gone. My necromancer, my best friend, he died too. I'm the last one left out of everyone I ever knew. I am nine thousand nine hundred years older than any human in the universe." Her free hand stroked the pad that would open the airlock. She was contemplative as she voiced the despair she wore like a shawl around her borrowed body. "How many times can you lose everyone before you don't want to keep going?"
Paul took the second risk of their life to squeeze Pyrrha's hand and ask, "Do you want to find out together?"
Pyrrha did not look at them, but took her hand away from the pad. “I won’t be around forever, you know,” she said quietly. “Or maybe I will. I don’t know which one’s worse.”
Paul did not give themselves time to hesitate. The fingers of their free hand gripped Pyrrha’s chin and drew her to face them. They knew their eyes were unsettling, but Pyrrha didn’t seem to find them so. “The only worse thing,” they told her, “would be facing it alone.”
Pyrrha regarded them with that easy good nature as always. Only Paul could feel the slight tremble in her hand. “Paul,” she said, gentle and guarded. “You don’t want an old broken thing. I don’t even remember how to do this anymore. I don’t know if I can.”
Paul was not deterred. Their body fell still the way it did when they were poised before a fight. Pyrrha noticed the change, they could see it in the flicker of her brows, but she did not comment. Paul shifted their grip to cradle the side of her jaw. “No expectations,” they told her. “It doesn’t have to be anything. But my future is as long as yours now. At least let me walk with you at the start.”
They stood there, on the edge of something. Pyrrha loomed over Paul, so much so that she had to bend a little to allow their reach. Her eyes were beautiful and dark. Paul saw the moment she decided not to hide what she was feeling.
They were right. She was breathtaking.