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Octavia wouldn't admit it aloud, but she's grateful when the Covenant of Blood has a sudden, emergency fault in her main engines and has to drop out of the warp. It's been a terrible trip, the ship fighting her even more than usual—could it have been feeling the faulty connections? is there a machine spirit equivalent to discomfort? she doesn't want to know—and she's tired, aching, and shaky as she pours herself out of the Navigator's throne. Her little guardian acolytes shuffle after her as she makes her way to the door.
When it opens, Octavia startles at the discovery that one of First Claw is kneeling just outside the door, the way she imagines a faithful Astartes would in meditation at a Chapter holy site. She shouldn't be surprised; it isn't the first time, though usually he's standing opposite, and he's never been unarmored before. "Uzas?"
He turns to look at her, black eyes glittering in the low light, his face pulled into a snarl by old scars. "Octavia. You are, mm, you are well?"
She nods. "As well as can be when the ship feels like this." Her eyes flick down—barely down; he's nearly as tall kneeling as she is standing—to where his robes meet over his chest. "What's the occasion that has you out of armor?"
"Nnh." His face shifts slightly, a microexpression too inhuman for her to read. "Damaged it. Last Raid. Waiting for repairs."
"I hope you weren't hurt," Octavia says, and surprises herself by meaning it.
Uzas shrugs. "Can't remember." He pulls his robe open enough to bare his chest, too broad and too pale, marked all over with scars—some old and faded, others fresher and livid pink or purple. "Can't tell."
It's unsettling to see him like that. The bare flesh, the marks where something happened that was brutal enough to carve through his battleplate and into his skin. The inflamed connection ports that need attention they'll likely never get. The remains of an old service tattoo over his hearts, just enough ink left to make it clear this was something other than the standard Night Lords winged skull.
"I'm going down to the mess," Octavia says. You learn after a while to take any chance you get to recover, and the engines won't be offline for too long. Hopefully.
She's not too surprised when Uzas follows her. He's strangely quiet without the hum and snarl of his armor, a looming presence at her back. The armor is just an intimidating silhouette. The real danger is the heretic who wears it.
But he's not here to threaten her, is he? As Octavia gets herself a bowl of nutrient gruel and a cup of reconstituted recaf, she ponders that. Uzas is here to be a watch dog, not keeping an eye on her but keeping anything from coming after her.
She sits down at the table with her miserable facsimile of a meal and Uzas sits across from her, staring. "Are you still expecting more echoes to come after me?"
He shrugs. "Always possible. Have you killed again?"
Octavia touches the bandana that hides her third eye. "No." Once was more than enough, a horror that won't leave her memory alone.
"Good." He watches her as she spoons the gruel into her mouth. She misses food, but she knows Septimus would tell her to be grateful; for the serfs of the lower decks, the gruel is strictly rationed. Uzas doesn't eat. She's never seen any of the Night Lords eat, though they must. She assumes they have some private space for that, where mere mortals can't see them do it.
"So you're here to fight them off if they show up, because the ship needs me."
"Yes. I—yes." Uzas scrubs his face with his hands in a gesture so human it makes Octavia's heart twinge. "My brothers think I'm broken. That I... There are things I can't do anymore. But I can kill a threat that's in front of me."
"I see." His hands are on the table now, huge and rough, with cracked nails and scarred knuckles. He probably looks that battered all over, with the way he throws himself into battle. Even demigods have no easy time of it out here in the dark.
Without letting herself think about it, Octavia puts one of her hands on top of Uzas'. She's grown pale since the Night Lords kidnapped her, but her skin looks tanned and healthy compared to his pallor. He runs warm, though, and that feels good in the perpetual chill of the ship.
"Why do you do that?" he asks.
Octavia hesitates. "I... I've had little chance to touch anyone since Talos found me," she says. "It's isolating. Lonely. You... I don't want to say anything that will offend you."
He grunts. "Go on. Can't hurt my feelings."
"You seem isolated too."
Uzas nods slowly. He turns his hand over as if to clasp hers; her entire hand fits in his palm. He closes his fingers over hers more carefully than she would have thought possible. "You want us to be allies, little witch?"
"I think we already are." Octavia pushes her bowl away and places her other hand on top of Uzas', stroking his battered knuckles. "But maybe we could be more."
"Hnn." Uzas watches her hands for a long moment before at last he nods. "Maybe so."