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They won't make it, that's clear. They aren't good enough for this; they never will. Exandria will fall, and it will be their fault.
She looks at herself in the clear mirror of her room. Gods, she looks awful. Poorly healed wounds, bruises all over her neck and chest from being thrown around. Many, many burns all over her body, and the thing she hates the most, her once bright red hair, burnt. It's not all of it, just the hair tips, but it still makes her want to cry. In fact, she does cry.
Hair holds memories, said her people, all keeping their hair long and beautifully braided. They live hundreds of years, she'll live hundreds of years, all of them filled with memories of people she won't want to forget.
And yet there she is, with rusty scissors she found in Percy's workshop, in front of the mirror in her room.
She approaches them to her hair with trembling hands, before making the first cut. She has no idea what she's doing, just making sure the darkened part goes. Another snip. More blackish red hair falls to the floor.
In the meantime, she thinks about everything that is going away with her hair. Hope, maybe? Is she giving up hope? She doesn't know. Not Vox Machina, either. Never them. But the bright-eyed wonder she had when she began to travel with them, the innocence, in some way, has faded. She isn't the same naive girl she was. She's fighting dragons. Things have gotten serious. And though she still tries to find the good in everyone, with everything she has seen, mostly the Conclave and Raishan, that belief that everyone has good in them falters.
Snip, snip, snip. She looks at the mirror again. Her eyes are red, puffy, and she's trembling. They aren't even tears of sadness, but of anger. Of frustration. This shouldn't be happening. She should be traveling with her friends, having fun, and fighting occasional monsters. Completing her Aramente with people by her side. But the pressure is too strong, all eyes are on her, on Vox Machina. The people, not only the Ashari, but the entirety of Exandria, depend on her now.
And she can't falter, so she cuts away that fear, and it's instantly replaced by anger. Because she's so, so fucking mad at everything, right now. And she cries because breaking down wouldn't fix anything. She cries before she harms someone.
It's not fair. It really isn't fair. This isn't what she wanted to be. This isn't what she wanted to do. Of course, saving the world and being heroes sounds great, but it just isn't. She thinks about the past, where she heard tales of mighty heroes and thought that she wanted to do great thing. And she thinks about the future, a future where maybe, just maybe, she and the entirety of Vox Machina survive. They save the world, great. The dragons are slain.
And the years pass, and all of her friends die of old age, and she's alone. Back to square one, back to the little girl who never knew how to make friends.
It's just not fair. She looks at the mirror, throws the scissors away as if she had been burnt, and before she can think twice, it's broken into pieces. Her knuckles, red, are bleeding, with bits of crystals piercing her skin. She doesn't feel the pain, just the blood beginning to run down her arm. In the broken glass, she sees her reflection, and looks away. She doesn't even recognize herself anymore.
While she's focused on trying not to harm herself further, she hears steps and a familiar gasp. Fuck, she forgot to lock the door. "Gods, Keyleth, are you okay?" Percy rushes inside, grabbing her hand. Doesn't look good.
"I'm fine," she casts a healing word on herself, muttering a quick "it'll all be okay", though she doesn't believe it.
"Were you cutting your hair?" He asks, still holding her hand awkwardly while he cleans the blood with a handkerchief in a practiced motion.
"Hm? What made you think that?" She sighs, dropping herself on the bed. He goes to grab the scissors she had thrown away, sitting next to her.
"The scissors. And, uh, your hair…"
"Yeah, I fucked it up." She mutters, pressing her knees against her chest, sighing. "It got burnt from…The dragons, you know. Thordak. That...Gods."
"If you want to get your hair cut…properly… I could do it. I had sisters. I know how to." The way he speaks in past still breaks her heart.
"You…You know how to cut hair?"
"Yes. I—I don't know if I'll remember everything, but I believe I would do a fairly good job. If you're willing to let me, of course." He sits on the bed, examining the scissors. Not ideal, but he had worked with worse. He had had to cut his own hair in the streets with less. "I can try."
"Sure, go on." There's no point in resisting. She sighs, allowing him to begin working. They stay in silence. Not an uncomfortable one, just silence, but gods, they used to talk too much. But now…
"We don't talk anymore, do we?" He throws her out of her thoughts, and it makes her question if he can read her mind.
"We don't have time to do so, anyway. There are dragons to kill. There are too many things to do," she answers, casting another quick healing spell on her burnt arm, feeling exhaustion all across her body. Pike is too tired to heal all of them properly; they all are. They haven't been having good days recently. He's not in a much better state, almost shaking. It's been a long time since either of them slept well, and it shows. She sometimes manages five, maybe six hours of sleep, whereas the bags under his eyes indicate much less. It's almost admirable that he's keeping himself awake, even more than he manages to fight with the same vigor.
She stays quiet while he works. He seems to know what he's doing. She wonders who taught him to cut hair. By the way he does it, it's obvious he learnt it from someone. The little hand gestures, the little flicks, it's clear he's imitating someone's mannerisms. Maybe his mother, maybe one of his older sisters. She doesn't exactly know his family tree. He still doesn't talk much about it. It hasn't even been that long since he lost everyone.
"How are you doing?" He suddenly asks, setting the scissors on the bed. He's finished. There isn't a mirror near; she just punched the only one, so she has to trust he's done an acceptable job.
"It would be a lie to say I'm fine," she breathes, looking at her recently healed knuckles, "but there is nothing I can do to fix it, so I'll just say I'm not doing as badly as I could. What about you?"
"I…" he pauses. "I've been through hell already. Just recently, I've realized that maybe I'm not dreaming and that I'm actually with all of you. I thought for the longest time this was a weird fever dream I made up on that cell. I've hit rock bottom already, multiple times. But I'm not alone anymore…and it can only get better from here, hm?" He mutters, with a smile that doesn't reach his eyes. He looks miserable, just like her.
She turns to face him, with her eyes still locked on the floor. "I just hope you're right. I need a break from…everything."
"We all do."
"Maybe a trip to Zeprah, or even Whitestone. Without dragons, without anything to worry about."
They stay like that for a minute before they lock eyes and immediately pull each other into a tight hug. She tries to hold herself together, but the second she hears him sob, she starts crying alongside him. She clutches his coat, and he grabs her tighter, like she'll disappear if he lets go. It's a rare moment of vulnerability between them, usually so composed, because they have to be. In the eyes of the people, they're the heroes of Vox Machina. He's Lord de Rolo, and she's the soon-to-be Voice of the Tempest. But here, in the softness of a hug between two broken people, they're just Percy and Keyleth.
They pull away after a few minutes. He wipes away his tears, looking embarrassed, and she does the same thing. It's almost awkward, like they've acted out of impulse, but they soon dissolve into laughter.
"Fuck, we should do this more often," Percy says, lying back in the bed.
"We really should. I've missed you," she lies next to him, looking at the ceiling. She takes off her shoes, not wanting to stain the bedsheets further. Blood will already be hard to clean. "Where did you learn to cut hair?"
"My mother taught me. I used to spend more time with her than with my father, and so, I picked up some things from when she cut my sister's hair. She didn't trust the hairdresser to do it properly," he chuckles. "She would have loved you." He mutters with a softer voice. "By the way, next time you want to get your hair cut, please tell me before punching the mirror, will you?" He pleads, with a tint of concern in his voice.
"I will, don't worry. I-I just had an outburst, I'll make sure it doesn't happen again."
"I hope it doesn't," he says, looking down at his own prosthetic hand. "We'll make it out alive. We'll make it." He reassures, apparently sensing her doubt.
"Could you…" she avoids the topic. She still needs her time to believe they'll actually make it. "Could you stay for the night? I know it sounds weird, and that you'd probably rather sleep by yourself, and I'd rather sleep by myself too but I've been having nightmares and—and" she trails off.
"No, no, it's fine. I'll stay. If I'm being honest, I didn't want to sleep alone tonight either. It's too much to process, and honestly, I don't trust myself. So we keep an eye on each other, hm?"
"Yeah, I would like that. I'll change. Do you want to go get your nightclothes?"
"Yes, yes, give me a minute. This is like a sleepover?"
"A what?"
"Spending the night together, with a friend…You never had one?"
"No."
"Me neither."
They do spend the night together. It's surprisingly intimate, like they're, in fact, keeping each other safe and steady. Because, in some way, they truly are.
They don't exactly cuddle, but they do stay close, like they are having a sleepover. In fact, it's something fairly new to both of them, to sleep with a friend in the same bed. Neither of them were…exactly sociable as kids. Gods, he learned Celestial in his free time; that wasn't normal child behavior. Even his parents, always so proud of his intellect, were worried. And Keyleth…Well, she had rocks as friends. She even made them dresses! Being always so focused on her studies and training, preparing herself for the Aramente, and developing social skills hadn't been an exact priority. And even in Vox Machina, she had struggled to find her place. Vax had Vex, Vex had Vax, Scanlan, Pike, and Grog went together. And she went by herself.
At least, until Percy entered the group. Who would have thought that she would have ended up calling that stranger in the cell, the complete opposite of her, darkness, whereas she was light, her best friend?
As they both begin to drift off to sleep in the safety of each other's arms, they realize something.
Having a best friend, someone who cares so deeply about you…doesn't feel half bad. And maybe, just maybe, if they remain together, there's still hope for the world.
There's still hope for them.