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Order sat at the very edge of the roof, not even a ledge between her and the fall. There was not technically rooftop access at the Atlas compound, but that had never stopped him before.
They were alone. This was notable, they almost never were. Usually he surrounded himself with people. A reminder that she was a person, rather than a detached observer.
But sometimes the pressure to participate felt like too much, for one who had never had the ability to before. It was almost relaxing, to find a place alone, to be absolutely still, as if to become stone. Allow for physical sensation to melt away into the background, forgotten.
Even still, it was not quiet. Just now there were countless different things calling for attention.
Across the city two friends argued about who had left a towel on the floor. It had been neither of them. Their pet had pulled it out from the hamper.
A few floors below a worker smiled as she blew cool air over her tea. Her coworker had just given it to her, and it would have burned to drink at its current temperature. It warmed her chilled hands.
On a different planet, a wave crashed against a nameless beach that had once been known by many. And it was okay because she was not there.
In another universe a deer is being hunted. Its hunter is slow, and the shot just fired will miss. The deer will live for now.
Somewhere else he is the hunter, though his prey is not deer. Order will not be slow, her shot will not miss.
The wind in a desert far away whips sand into the air.
In an office two buildings away the wind blows papers onto the floor.
Pierce finds their way onto the roof, and walks towards Order's still form. They do not speak, but they do sit next to her, leaning against her shoulder, their eyes closed. They are warm.
They sit there for hours.
Somewhere the sun rises, and a hunt is complete, victorious. Elsewhere, it is midday, and the hunt is abandoned for easier prey. Here the sun begins to set.
Eventually, Order shifts, takes a breath, and Pierce speaks, “Sometimes it feels like you forget you’re a person too.”
It is still so loud. It has never once stopped. There is endless talking and moving and heat. Order does not know silence, stillness.
“I do not forget, I never have,” she pauses. “Sometimes I wish I was not.”
It would likely be incredibly boring.
Pierce does not reply, so Order continues, “It was… easier when I did not have to think about it. About how much there is all of the time. Mostly I still do not.”
Just now a baby three solar systems away takes his first steps. Just now the first leaves of a fall not touching this summer warm city begin to fall. Still there is more.
There will always be more.
“I am never weak. To be weak is to be dead. But.” Order tilts his head back to face the night sky. Anyone else would be blind to the stars, the lights from the city below never dimming. Order could point out each one by name, and then many more that remain nameless. He had been nameless too, once. “Sometimes I am tired. This helps.”
Pierce always knew better than to ask, Order knows. At first, Order thinks, it started with guilt. Pierce probably had thought they had no right, after everything.
It was funny. One of the two people she would answer anything for, no matter the consequences, refused to ever ask. And still, they got more out of her with their silence than anyone’s questions ever had.
In another world she was moving, busy. In this world there was nowhere they had to be. Always part of him now would be moving, thinking. Knowing, rather than just observing.
This part of him feels Pierce shiver slightly, dressed more for the warm day it had been than the cool night it has become. Order looks down at Pierce, and they sit up, slowly opening their eyes. They glow, just slightly, in the darkness.
“You are cold, and you need to sleep.”
On a planet across the galaxy there is fire, nothing but fire. Across the city, there are puddles of water, still left from three days ago when it rained.
“Wanna head down with me? Make sure I don't fall.”
Order stands, helps Pierce up, and together they go inside.