DISCLAIMER: Noein belongs to Kazuki Akane.
~ Rolling Snake Eyes ~
"Don't cry," he says.
She sobs.
Not knowing what to do, he glances around the room, as if expecting someone else to give him a clue. He sees that dimension hopper kid disappear, leaving behind only a brief sprinkle of electric-blue confetti.
She turns, to tell the kid the good news, that her partner is okay... but the happiness drains from her voice as she catches sight of the last few fading flakes of 'blue snow' - the rest of the sentence tripping from her mouth mechanically as her mind processes the reality of the situation.
Of course, now that the dimensions are stabilized, everyone has been sent back to where they belong.
She turns back to her partner, her hands clutching at the front of his shirt. She worries that she is leaving red streaks on the fabric and her grip loosens, but there is no blood on her hands. For a moment she wonders why she thought there should have been.
The memories of him being shot, of kneeling beside him with her palms pressed against his wound to staunch the flow of blood, of realizing her efforts were futile and just trying to make him comfortable in his last moments, of his body dissolving right out from under her fingertips... those memories are already starting to fade from her mind.
The panic she felt at the idea of losing him is still sharp within her, pushing adrenaline through her system. The one who disappeared and this one, they diverged at the point of being shot at. He isn't the one who was hit. He isn't the same one that died in her arms moments ago. But he is still her partner, her bodyguard, the one who has been at her side through all of this.
He still doesn't understand any of the science behind all the wild time-space stuff that was going on; he just knows that it was something ridiculously dangerous and that his partner just saved the universe in general and his life in particular. So, yeah, maybe she's entitled to be a little overwhelmed right now.
When she starts to pull away from him, he lays his hands on her shoulders and gently draws her closer.
"Go ahead," he says. "Let it all out."
She buries her face against his chest and weeps.
~end~