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Asrickus cupped Aura’s head in his hands, running her fingers through the rionears hair. He shushes star in a soft, loving voice as they whine and shift again. She has the rionear in their lap, brushing hands through stars hair and rubbing their back up and down in slow, circular motions.
They do not cry, but they caress their love, trying to keep them comfortable. Their love had died. Over, and over, and over, and over again. Yet, the Taruxian couldn’t do anything but try and hold them, try and calm them or help, or let them live, something! Anything. It hadn’t worked, no, not until Daiv had shocked their heart, had raised the volts until the slow beats started up again.
The Taruxian just pulled the rionear as close as she could, pressing their flesh together as they whisper sweet nothings into the ears that do not move. Stars tail just lays against the bed, no life to it, no shifting, no tuck, no wag. There were no movements from their dear, their darling, their starlight.
The door creaks, but they do not look to it. They press kisses to a face that has almost no warmth to it, kissing every tear that falls from closed eyes. The rionear’s arm is bandaged to almost unrecognizable layers.
However, they remembered how it looked. It had been a gnarled, tinted blue limb that had been burned in intricate patterns. It had trailed the rionears veins, mapping them out like the rivers on terra that seared the earth within the Amazon Forest.
They pressed a kiss above the bandage, kissed along shoulders toned by hard work within their craft. The rionear had calloused hands from endless hours of work, and the Taruxian kissed every last digit.
Only then did their tears start to flow.
It was slow at first, a drip slowly pathing its way down the Taruxians cheek, before another followed, weaving along that same path and intricating it. Then, there were more. They followed creases of his face, dripping onto the sheets that the Rionear had been moved to.
The Taruxian cupped the back of stars head, laying it back to the pillow. They pulled that white, medical blanket over their lover, and they stood up. Asrickus didn’t want to leave. They wanted to stay till those eyes cracked open, till that mouth spoke his name, till he could taste the lips his lover enveloped him with.
Yet, he stood and took a step back. On his way out he passed by Daiv, carrying a new box of equipment, multiple bands for exercise and physical therapy, to make sure the Rionear stayed fit within their coma.
The two locked eyes. Red met blue. It may have lasted a second, but Daiv’s eyes filled with that same care as always, but they did not stop Asrickus from walking. The clinic shut behind her with an echoing click, and they could feel the leaves of fall crunch under them.
The Taruxian pressed their palm to the waystone, and the world around them shifted away from the medical clinic that inhabited their lover, instead bringing them back home. It felt..cold, empty without the smile of their firefly.
Romeo looked to him, but he could not meet their eyes as he walked. The button to open their house, their home within the mountain, felt too slow. The halls were empty, quiet. His bed was hollow. Laying down, he reached out to where his firefly typically slept, but it just dug into the blankets.
Her hand sat there for a minute, no, maybe an hour. The door to their base opened and shut multiple times as Romeo passed in and out. At some point TPK snuggles into his chest, and he buried his face in their fur.
The tears came like a river, and he cried for what felt like ages. They painted and streaked his face in slick trails. The world continued around him but he was stuck in the same loop. His chest felt tight.
Yet, he couldn’t stay for long. After hours, days? However long, the Taruxian stood up and headed towards the cell that continued the murderer. His bow felt like it begged in his pocket, felt like it desperately cried to put an arrow through their skull, but his fists just clenched and she stood outside the entrance.
A minute is all it took before he turned around. If he stayed.. He would just cause more damage. His communicator buzzed in his pocket but he just reached up, letting his hair cascade down around him like an umbrella. He sat with his back to the entrance, letting his hair envelop him as he ranted out all of his emotions, even if the man hidden inside couldn’t hear, it felt like a weight being lifted.
Yet, the only thought in his mind…was watching Aura live and die again, watching his firefly enter a cycle that felt like it lasted years. All she wanted was to hold star again.