Work Text:
“What’s love?”
The lights in the parlor car aren’t dimmed, not quite, but they’re dark enough that Stelle knows it’s time for the Express members to begin retiring for the night. Only two people sit on the chaise lounge - her and Sunday. She’s said her thoughts aloud before her brain can veto the idea.
Sunday pauses. The needle in his hand hovers in midair, a white piece of string stretching from the ink blue cloth that lies on his lap. The scene is achingly familiar to one she’s forgotten (a woman with gloved hands, a smile that filled the room, a well-loved coat stitched together with thread like spider’s silk).
“Pardon me, Miss Stelle?”
She knows he’s heard her, by the way his wings flutter nervously by his face. Stelle rolls her eyes and enunciates the words again, trying to elaborate this time.
“What’s love to you?”
“Whatever brought this on?” Sunday says awkwardly. He’s set down his sewing fully now, a strange expression on his face. “Forgive me, but I was under the impression that you and Dan Heng…”
Stelle waves her hand, beginning to regret ever bringing the conversation up. “I don’t mean it like that. I was just curious, I guess. You know that I’ve only had my memories for about 2 years now, right? They started from about the time I joined the Express.”
He’s beginning to understand, she can see the dawning clarity on his face. “Yes, I heard. So you want to know what love is?”
“Sort of, yeah,” Stelle says sheepishly. “I think I’ve got a pretty good grip on the other emotions - happiness, sadness, anger, all that stuff. It’s just…”
How does she explain that she doesn’t know what this complicated feeling is that swirls in her chest? She doesn’t know whether she loved before, before her memories were stripped from her mind like the meat off a bone and she woke up vulnerable and alone. All she knows is that when she looks at Kafka’s wanted poster, it feels like a part of her has been scooped, gouged out. All she knows is that when she sits in late-night silence with the Express Crew, it feels like she’s returned home.
“Love…” Sunday murmurs.
A soft tune from the phonograph fills the silence, ‘If I Can Stop One Heart From Breaking’. The look on Sunday’s face is more complicated than she can ever put into words.
“The man I called father once told me that love was devotion,” he says eventually. “I’m inclined to agree.”
Stelle rests with that idea for a while. She’s devoted to her family, to the Trailblaze. She loves her family, the Nameless. They both seem mutually exclusive, but maybe she's wrong.
(If she was once devoted to the Stellaron Hunters, does that mean she loved them? Would selling your life, your soul away be the ultimate act of love?)
She doesn’t like the sound of that.
“You were devoted to Gopher Wood,” she points out. “But you didn’t love him.”
Sunday looks nauseous, and Stelle wonders if she should just drop it and change the subject. But eventually he heaves a deep breath, and covers his face with his wings. His eyes close shut.
“No. I didn’t.”
She reaches out for his hand then and squeezes tightly. He opens his eyes, and smiles.
“Perhaps then, love is willful devotion. The only person whom I’ve ever loved with full force is my sister. I am devoted to her. I would die for her.”
“Wow,” Stelle whistles. “That’s heavy.”
That earns a laugh out of him. “It is, isn’t it? Something tells me love doesn’t have to be so complicated, though. Robin would say that love is found in a bird’s song. I…am inclined to agree.”
“So it’s like this,” Stelle says. “I’m fully devoted to the Express. I love the Express.”
“Maybe it is,” Sunday answers. “I think I’m still searching for the answer myself.”
The song finishes, the carriage falls silent. Stelle fiddles with the hem of her sleeve, musing over his words.
“Do you love the Express crew?” she asks. “Even though you don’t walk the Path of the Trailblaze?”
Yet, she thinks silently.
There is a long silence, stretching out to the end of space and back. She doesn’t regret asking the question, but it still feels melancholy all the same.
But then–
“I do,” Sunday says. “I am not devoted to Akivili…but I am to all of you. I am indebted to you. I fear Mr. Yang would say that that is not the healthiest form of affection, but it’s all I know. It might change the more that I journey with the Nameless. Only time will tell.”
Stelle nods, and then grins.
“Softie,” she teases, and he covers his face with his wings again.
“Please,” he sighs with a soft smile, “don’t mention any of this to March. I'll never hear the end of it.”
“What is love?”
She asks Himeko next, as they sit in silence listening to the radio. They’re waiting for a broadcast from the IPC; details on a recent asteroid storm that’s blocking parts of the star rail. Himeko’s got a pile of notes in her lap and a pen in her hand, yawning as she waits for the monotonous trade updates to be over.
“Love?” she asks. “What kind of love?”
“There are different kinds?”
“Of course,” says Himeko. “Romantic, platonic, familial, and of course everything in between. It’s hard to define, but easy to feel.”
“All kinds,” Stelle answers. “I just want to know what it is, really.”
Himeko smiles, resting her chin on her hand. “It’s hard to say. It’s different for every person, after all. I believe love is connection.”
“But you can connect with people you don’t care about,” Stelle frowns. She connects her fist with her enemies about 10 times a week.
This is proving to be more difficult than she was expecting.
“True,” Himeko admits. “But love is a different kind of connection, I think. It is a connection you wouldn’t want to live without.”
The radio crackles, and Himeko fiddles with the dials. The voice of the reporter filters through once more.
“For example, take Welt and I. It is not a romantic love,” she laughs, “he’s much too old for me after all. Neither is it purely platonic either, otherwise we wouldn’t have such meaningful conversations like we do. But despite it being so difficult to define, if Welt decided tomorrow that he didn’t want to be a Nameless any longer, I would feel sad.”
“Because that connection had been lost?”
“Precisely,” Himeko says. “The same goes for you as well, Stelle. If any of my beloved crew members were to leave I'd be upset.”
“There was another Nameless that left, wasn't there?” Stelle says. “Did you have that same connection to him?”
Himeko scoffs - she's not usually a resentful person but whenever Mr. Yang's old friend gets brought up, irritation lines her face. “Void Archives? Absolutely not. He's not one of my precious people.”
Stelle grins. That means it's not just because she's a Nameless - Himeko loves her for her.
The older woman's definition of love makes sense - when Stelle had thought Dan Heng would leave the Express, she'd felt fear bubble up from deep within her bones. It's that feeling of seperation, of loss.
Do you only feel love when it's leaving? she thinks sadly.
Is that why she misses Kafka and Firefly and Silver Wolf and even Blade? Did she love them, once upon a time?
Himeko sees the shift in her expression. She clears her throat; Stelle looks up to find her smiling.
“The best thing about love,” says Himeko, “is that once that mutual connection is formed it's surprisingly difficult to break. It might waver or fade over time, but I don't think it ever leaves.”
She rests a hand on Stelle's knee. “I love you, my forever young one. We all do, here on the Express. Our connection is a bond formed from trust and affection.”
A candle is lit inside her then, Stelle thinks, spreading its warmth from the tips of her fingers to the base of her toes. She is loved. She is loved.
The radio crackles into life and the broadcast begins. Himeko leaves her with one last smile and then busied herself with hastily scribbled notes and calculations.
Stelle listens along with her. She likes Himeko's definition.
“What is love?” she asks Mr. Yang.
He's next, of course. Both Himeko and Mr. Yang are the two people she looks up to the most. They're who she goes for when she needs sound advice.
The old man reaches out a hand for her to grab, and Stelle hauls herself onto the jutting rocks that lead to flat ground. They’re on a minor planet, heading towards the Intergalactic Embassy the IPC have only recently established. Although trekking would be a better word - the path to the ancient building is long and winding, difficult for bipedal organisms to traverse.
Mr. Yang pushes down on his cane again and they’re off, walking on a more level path to the Embassy. He’s silent for a while, and Stelle wonders whether she should repeat the question.
“When I was a child,” he says eventually. “Love for me was admiration. There were very many a people who I admired back on my homeland, and very many a people I admire now in my life as a Nameless. I loved…I love them all.”
“Admiration…” Stelle echoes. She swats some of the native beetles away with a hand. “I mean, it's true that I admire everyone on the Express. Even March, sometimes.”
Mr. Yang laughs, and it’s warm and rich like chocolate. “It’s impossible not to love March. Though, Stelle, you should know that my definition of love has changed over time. Age does that to you, age and experience.”
“What’s love to you now?”
“Hm,” Mr. Yang smiles. “I find I agree with the answer Himeko gave you. Connection is, after all, a fundamental part of being a Nameless. It’s also a key component of the thing we call love.”
Stelle grins, toeing the snail paths in the dirt. “So Himeko told you, huh?”
“She did,” he says. “And I think your search to find your answer is very admirable indeed. Love can be a difficult thing to grasp.”
“Really?” Stelle replies. “I would have thought loving is easy.”
“Maybe for some,” Mr. Yang admits. “But the hardest thing about love isn’t love itself. It is its antithesis - loss. After all, losing a loved one is the deepest pain one can experience.”
It’s times like this where Mr. Yang gets this very specific look on his face. Stelle watches as a faraway gaze enters his eyes; Mr. Yang holds the weight of dead stars, of an entire life filled with struggle and hardship but also of…well, love.
She nudges his arm softly as they walk and his gaze snaps back to her with a smile. He clears his throat, cane tap, tapping away.
“So love is connection. And…admiration.” Stelle says.
“And also affection. And companionship,” Mr. Yang replies. “Your companions are the people you love, after all. They are for this old man, anyhow.”
“Companionship. Someone once told me your companions are people who you'd share a slice of cake with.”
Mr. Yang laughs at this and looks down at her fondly. There’s a twinkle in his eyes.
“You could put it that way, yes. If you’d share your precious possessions with someone instead of keeping it for yourself, I’d say that’s an act of love. Including sharing cake, it seems.”
“I’d share cake with all of you,” Stelle answers with a grin. “Maybe not Dan Heng, since he’s not a fan of sweet things. He’s not a fan of anything actually. I swear he has the personality of a brick wall.”
“I can think of a few things even our resident Archivist is a fan of,” Mr. Yang says cryptically, looking at Stelle with a look she can’t quite pinpoint. She decides to shelve that away for later.
“Himeko told me there are different kinds of love,” says Stelle. “Are they all some form of companionship?”
“I’d say so.” Mr. Yang brushes away some leaf fronds with his cane and steps forward. “Although perhaps companionship is the wrong word. Take parental love for example. While it is true that your child can be a companion, they are also something vulnerable and precious you have to teach and protect. It is one of the many reasons why love is so hard to define.”
“But you still hold affection towards them, right?”
“Of course,” says Mr. Yang. “I hold a parental sort of love towards you all in the Express. I have a duty to teach and protect all of you.”
That warm feeling rekindles in her chest and Stelle smiles down at her feet. Mr. Yang truly is one of the wisest people she knows.
They walk in companionable silence for a while longer, until the crumbling walls of the Embassy loom into view and six-legged ambassadors rush forward to greet them in tones dripping with admiration.
Ah, so that’s why Mr. Yang’s view changed. Stelle thinks as the head ambassador shakes their hands with an admiring, but wary smile. This isn’t love. Love is something more.
Mr. Yang spares her a sympathetic view and they both mentally steel themselves for a few hours of interstellar trade talks. It's boring work, but Stelle takes the oppurtunity to sift through the advice she’s been given from the people around her.
She’s getting closer to the true meaning of love, she thinks.
“What’s love?”
She debates over asking Black Swan for a long time, before accepting that, above all, the memokeeper knows a lot more about the world than Stelle does. Her contribution is going to be valuable, at least.
“Oh?” Black Swan says. The sound of Shush cleaning glasses in the background (that didn’t actually need cleaning) fills the silence.
“If I may,” says the robot, “I have 69 love jokes stored in my database. Would you care for one, Nameless?”
“Please, no.” Stelle groans, resisting the urge to bang her head on the table.
He does it anyway, because when has Shush ever listened to her, ever. “This is one of my favourites. If you were a vegetable…you’d be a cutecumber."
Stelle actually does bang her head on the table then.
"Do you get it?”
The silence that follows is unbearably painful. Stelle has half a mind to ask Black Swan to remove the memory from her head right there and then.
“I see my attempts were in vain,” says Shush sadly. “Not to worry! I have 68 more–”
“We’re fine, Shush,” Black Swan answers gently, clearly taking pity on Stelle. “Maybe later.”
The robot hums and busies himself with cleaning again. Black Swan clears her throat, turning back to the conversation.
“I would say love is different depending on your viewpoint. Occasionally people can think they love someone, but their true feelings are very different. Love can turn to hate in the blink of an eye. There are even occasions where…people forget they ever loved someone in the first place.”
Stelle tries to disguise the thoughts that are most likely playing out on her face in picture-perfect quality. Is that what happened to her? She’s forgotten whether she’d ever loved anyone before the Stellaron was implanted within her.
When she thinks about Kafka though, there’s an ache in her chest that feels eerily similar to loss. If what Mr. Yang said is true, does that mean she loved Kafka once upon a time? Has she forgotten that love?
“Ah, I’m sorry,” Black Swan says, reading her expression. “I touched a nerve.”
Stelle waves her concerns away with a hand. “Don’t worry. That’s partly why I’m asking - I want to know if I’ve ever loved someone before. If I still love them now, too.”
“Then I have to say love is care. You cannot love someone you are indifferent towards. Amongst every memory I have collected, the most beautiful ones are the ones of care and affection. A lover gifting flowers. A child feeding a stray cat. A mother rocking her baby. Those are the ones I treasure the most.”
“But how do I know whether I care for someone, whether I love someone if I’ve forgotten everything about them?” Stelle asks, a little despairingly.
“If they were in front of you right now,” Black Swan says softly. “Would that make you happy?”
The answer comes to her in a heartbeat.
“...yeah.”
“Then you have your answer.”
Black Swan gets up and thanks Shush for the meal, resting a hand on Stelle’s shoulder before she leaves. She gives it a light squeeze, and then walks back to her quarters.
"Love is complicated, that I will not deny," Black Swan says, before she exits. "But it makes for the sweetest memories."
Stelle’s left alone with her thoughts once more.
“What’s love?”
March makes a face. “Are you planning to get your head out of your ass and confess to Dan Heng, or is this another of your hypotheticals?”
Stelle throws a pillow at her. This was supposed to be a deep philosophical question but of course, that's not going to happen in the same way it did with the others when it comes to her and March.
…Stelle's actually grateful for that. Out of everyone on the Express, March outwardly shows her love for everyone the most. She's probably a love connoisseur. A love guru.
“It's a genuine question,” Stelle pouts, grabbing another pillow and hugging it to her chest. She reaches out for the bowl of sweets before her, unwrapping a red one and popping it into her mouth. “And the whole Dan Heng situation is still pending. Give me a chance on Amphoreus at least.”
“Hmm,” March hums, that teasing glint still shining away in her eye. Eventually she takes pity on her though and drops the subject. “Fine, whatever. You can't rush these things anyway.”
She waves her hand and beckons to Puffball; the warp trotter chirps and jumps onto the bed beside March. She scratches it behind the ears, thinking pensively.
“Love, huh. Is this about the Stellaron Hunters or…?”
“Kind of, yeah,” Stelle admits. “I've just been curious. What actually defines love? I don't know whether I've ever known the answer.”
“I think it's something you just learn over time,” March says. Her expression is uncharacteristically serious. “When I woke up in the Express with no memories, I didn't have anyone to love. I mean, I don't need to explain how terrifying that feeling is to you, right?”
“Yeah,” answers Stelle quietly. The vast emptiness of not knowing who you are or where you come from is like trying to step forward into mid-air. It's like always, always falling.
“But that soon changed.” March strokes Puffball with a grin. “I'm a pretty simple girl, after all! I love everyone and everything I like. In a way, I'd say love is happiness.”
“Happiness?” Stelle echoes.
“Happiness,” answers March defiantly. “I love that plant on the windowsill because it brightens up my room. I love Puffball here because they're warm and cosy. I love you, because even though you annoy the heck out of me most of the time–”
Stelle scoffs. “That's what friends are for.”
“-you make me really happy, Stelle. You listen to me when I go off on a rant, you paint my nails and laugh and talk, you fight alongside me in battle and you're always there if I need it. I think that's love. That's my kind of love anyway.”
Stelle grins and passes her the sweet bowl. Puffball startles at the sudden movement and shoots up, whacking March on the chin.
“Ow, Puffball! Stelle, that was totally your fault.”
“I love you too,” Stelle laughs.
March sticks her tongue out at her and opens up her magazine again, reading through the latest star charts and Faction gossip. Stelle mulls over her words.
Mr. Yang was right - some people do find it easier to love than others. For someone like March, loving comes easy. She's got so much love inside her that she can easily dish it out to whatever comes her way.
“You could be a follower of Idrila at this point,” Stelle says aloud.
“Could I?” March grins, batting her eyelashes. “I'm cute enough for it, don't you think? Although my hair isn't nearly as luscious as Argenti's is.”
Stelle groans. “Don't remind me. I keep begging for his 10-step hair care routine but he always says the key is unwavering devotion to the Beauty.”
March groans. “Why is always the men who are blessed with silky smooth hair? I would actually commit a crime for Dan Heng's dragon-length locks.”
“You and me both,” Stelle says, playing with her own unruly hair. They dissolve into a bout of surface-level ranting, laughing as they try half-finished braids on each other and compare hypothetical hairstyles on the people they love.
Stelle is happy around March and the others on the Express, and she doesn't think that will ever change.
This might be the purest form of love.
“What is love?”
Stelle throws the question in among their increasingly frequent late-night conversations. Dan Heng looks up from where he sits, next to her, shoulders touching, a mug of steaming chamomile for him and one of hot chocolate for her.
His gorgeous letter in handwritten Xianzhou calligraphy lies unfinished on the table. Her borrowed manga from March sits beside it. At some point in the night they'd stopped to talk - Stelle doesn't know how long it's been.
The question's stunned him, she can tell that much. In the dim night-light of an Express lounge car, with only the stars to keep them company, she can spot a faint pink blush coating the tips of his ears.
“I've asked the others,” she elaborates, half-mourning the way she's shying away from the elephant in the room. But this isn't the right time.
Sorry March, she thinks sheepishly.
“But I wanted to hear your view on it too.”
“What kind of love?” Dan Heng asks quietly.
“All kinds,” answers Stelle. They've shifted away from each other so they can talk properly, but in this position their knees still kiss. “What's love for you?”
Dan Heng stares at her. “Scientifically speaking, love itself is a biological chemical. Some species produce it in more abundance than others, whereas others are devoid of it entirely."
Stelle rolls her eyes. “I know that. But I'm talking about the feeling itself. What do you think love is?”
He's silent for a moment longer, eyes searching the floor as if he'll find the answer there. Stelle waits patiently.
“I find it difficult to love,” Dan Heng admits. In the quiet of the Express nights, he's always more vulnerable than usual. Especially around her. “But if I had to answer, I would say protection.”
“Love is protection?” says Stelle.
“Exactly.” Dan Heng plucks an imaginary burr from her clothes and then rests his hand on her knee. “What else can it be? There are very few things I love. I would like to keep them all safe. The two cannot be seperated.”
“You and March are polar opposites.” Stelle huffs out a laugh. “She loves everything.”
“She would,” Dan Heng says, rolling his eyes fondly. “That's March for you. I'm afraid my love is more selective than hers.”
Stelle takes another sip of her drink, musing over his words.
Protection. Dan Heng is the guard of the Express for a reason - he's very adept at warding off danger, no matter what that danger might be. Not just because of his quick reflexes and powerful fighting style (Stelle knows, she's sparred with him more times that she can count), but because he loves them all. That love drives him. It drives her too.
(And for someone who was denied anything of his own as a child, it's only natural that Dan Heng wants to keep his own prized possessions safe. In a way it's somewhat similar to a dragon hoarding his stash of gold).
“It's like how I use my lance to protect,” Stelle says with dawning clarity. “I can only do that because my want to keep the people I love safe is greater than the fear of any enemy I face.”
“That's one of the greatest forms of love I know,” replies Dan Heng. Stelle smiles and nudges him with her shoulder.
“Softie,” she teases. “You and Sunday both.”
Dan Heng rolls his eyes, moving his mug of tea before it spills. He takes Stelle's own finished drink and places them both onto the table.
“How about you?” he asks. “All this talk of love…have you found your answer?”
Stelle looks down at her hands. Truthfully she isn't quite sure. Everyone has their own notions and ideas when it comes to love. So then what's hers?
Does she even know how to love? She thinks she does but…
“For what it's worth,” Dan Heng says. “I think love isn't as complicated as you think it might be.”
She lifts her gaze. The soft look in Dan Heng's eyes never fails to steal her breath away.
“It isn't?”
“Sometimes love is in the little things.” Dan Heng replies. “Sometimes love can even be so simple as talking and listening to someone. I've grown to understand that more and more recently.”
“So communication?” Stelle says.
“Some forms of communication, yes.”
She sits with that idea for a while, leaning back into Dan Heng's shoulder. She loves him, she knows that. She loves these late night conversations and she loves listening to his voice. She would protect him with her life.
And he would do the same.
The lights blur overhead, and Dan Heng shifts his posture so she's leaning more heavily on his shoulder. Before Stelle knows it, she's yawning, and her eyelids are falling and Dan Heng is picking up her manga, slowly so as not to wake her and flicking through the pages.
She slips into sleep with the soft look he gives her etched into her mind. When she dreams, she dreams of an autumn leaf carried by a golden wind.
With Dan Heng she feels protected. With him, she feels safe.
“What is love?”
She asks the Slave this question. She's asked it many times before.
“Is that what you would like me to give you?” hums Elio. “Love?”
“Can someone like me have love?”
“I wonder…it is not impossible after all. If I can gift Kafka fear and grant Blade death, I can certainly steer you towards love. Is that the pact you would like to form with me?”
Stelle pauses. It's the biggest decision she will probably ever make.
“I want to feel whole,” she whispers.
“And so you shall, if you follow my command.”
“How? I was created to–”
“Under my law,” says Destiny's Slave, “I can make the impossible, possible. I can grant you the gift of love, as easy as I granted you the gift of life.”
Stelle raises her hands, head bowed, wrists bare. The Slave before her steps forward and presses her skin, pushing down on the vein.
“What is love?” she asks again.
There is a resounding click, and a heavy weight pulls at her arms. Stelle drops her hands, blinking at the cuffs that enclose her wrists. From each golden band stretches a ink-black string; the threads of destiny. She is now bound to the Finality forevermore.
“Love?” Elio says. He weaves the strings around his fingers, and tugs.
She falls to one knee, her head bowed as the world swims before her eyes. Destiny's Slave walks forward and raises her chin with one thin, slender finger.
Stelle looks into the eyes of the Slave who holds her soul in his hands. She feels no love from him.
“Love,” Elio says, “is sacrifice.”
And so she sacrifices her life for the future.
What is love? Stelle thinks to herself, as she stares at the wanted poster on the wall.
Devotion, connection, admiration, affection, companionship, happiness, protection–
(Sacrifice).
She trails a finger around Kafka's picture, an ache throbbing deep within her chest. This feeling within her is love, she knows that now. She'd loved Kafka and the Stellaron Hunters once upon a time.
...she might still do.
Is love this then? Chasing after a figure who she's unable to reach? Waiting for a future that might never arrive, if it means she'll get another chance? Wishing to remember the woman she's forgotten?
A part of Stelle knows it is. This is how it is to feel after all, it's painful and bloody and real.
It's also the answers everyone else gave. Love is a multitude of all those individual feelings and wishes, like how enough stars in the sky can make up an entire galaxy. It's something that can only be felt once everything else is also in place.
That's a pretty complicated answer, she thinks, walking away from the poster and heading over to her mirror. She reaches for the hairbrush and begins to comb through her knots.
So then, what about this?
Maybe love is when she wakes up tucked in bed after having fallen asleep on the chaises in the Parlor Car. Maybe love is when Pom Pom folds her laundry neatly on the side, or when Himeko asks her about her day or when Mr. Yang wakes up in the darkest hours of the night to subdue her restless Stellaron.
Maybe it's when Sunday passes her the last of his custard tarts, or when March drags her shopping so she can force her to replace her torn clothes. Maybe it's when Dan Heng brings her a meal after an entire day of Simulated Universe runs, or spars with her so she can hone her skills, or sits with her to answer her latest curiosities.
“Stelle, are you ready?”
Maybe it's this moment here. Where Dan Heng stands in her doorway, arms crossed as he gazes at her back. She can see his expression in the reflection and maybe it's a look of love.
Maybe...actually no, this time she knows this as a fact. Love is in the little moments. March was right, in a way - it is possible to love many, many things, if you know how.
Stelle doesn't think she has that much love in her. But she has enough for her family and the people she cares about, and, really, that's all that matters isn't it?
What is love? Stelle thinks.
Love is…here.
Stelle finishes brushing her hair and slips on her gloves. There's a lightness in her heart she likes the feel of. Spinning around to face Dan Heng, she shoots him a grin.
“Ready!” she answers, and they head on out together.