EVIE
I want your midnights
Evie has never been ashamed to display how she feels, but as Deimos opens his arms and she stumbles into them there’s a moment of guilt. She so rarely ever breaks like this, and it feels like a dramatic response when held up against the outcome. They had all survived. The Ursur had been slain. Cleanup is already underway. Why can’t she focus on those successes instead? She had taken all of Talyson’s abuse with a professional smile for years, so why can’t she shove her feelings back in the box now?Yet when Deimos poses his own questions, they are instantaneous validations of her distress. Her heart aches around the hurting edges with a fierce, abiding love for him that eases her back to some semblance of control. At least enough to speak instead of sob.
“Noah caught Sah and Talyson in his attack more than once. Sah was…invisible at first? There was no coordination.” As for fault, that’s a harder thing to judge. Stupidity abound did not necessarily imply guilt, and they had succeeded. Eventually. “All of them were wounded badly in intervals, but Talyson went down hard early on and I had to stay with him.” Recounting it step-by-step helps to quell the shake of her voice and the tangle of emotions in her chest. She can’t conceive of wishing she hadn’t healed someone, but the simple bitterness over the luckless pairing thrives in its place. “Noah and Sah responded when ordered, and Noah stepped between multiple times. But Talyson was giving orders too, and being demeaning, and had the gall to say they needed to meet up together to work on teamwork -” The composure she’d gained flies right back out of her hands, jaw clenching and tongue pressing painfully behind her teeth to stem the flow of anger.
Oh, but she has no intention of leaving that last question unanswered. Evie knows he won’t fight battles for her, but she won’t tempt him with the chance either. Not when she’s so certain about her own plan. “I told him to meet me in my office. I’m mailing him my open days. I can’t stand it anymore.” Her hands clench in the back of Deimos’ shirt, strangling the weave. “He’s not a Halovian now so I’m not taking his shit anymore!”
