For the first time in weeks, the otherworld was silent.
Mato let the slightest hint of a sigh slip from her lips, and then regretted it immediately, for it seemed the girl draped across her was not so fast asleep as she had thought. Twisting umber locks flowed from one chaotic sprawl to another and soon, there were those familiar eyes, gazing up at her again.
"Just checking," Mato excused herself, thought it felt hollow even to her. She was perhaps becoming paranoid about all the supernatural activity (or lack thereof) as of late. Too often, she would find the subtle flickering of sensation around her left eye catching her attention as she unconsciously scanned the nearby space for any sights of danger lurking.
The smile Yomi gave her in reply hadn't changed in all those weeks, small mercy. It still made Mato's heart flutter in the most annoying way.
"I don't mind." A manicured nail traced the fine mark just below Mato's ribs, where she had once been robbed of her life and survived despite it. "You look good like this."
Black Rock Shooter wasn't the kind of person who blushed very often, if at all. But Mato was, and colour slowly crept up her face all the same at such insinuations.
"I do look...kinda cool, don't I?"
"I wouldn't exactly say cool," replied the brunette, and the hand that was resting against the sleekness of Mato's belly slithered upward towards a new target.
"You're much prettier than me, Yomi. Even when you weren't yourself."
That stopped Yomi's hand in its tracks, with a finger just peeking under the edge of the sapphire bikini Mato's alter-ego, for whatever reason, was dressed in. Despite her outwardly calm appearance, Mato let herself panic just a tiny bit on the inside. Did I mess up again?
The planned round of gratuitous flattery stopped short as Yomi spoke once more, eyes far from her love's face.
"I didn't like being her. She was..." The brunette girl shivered visibly. "She wasn't nice at all. It scares me a little, to think that those feelings came from inside me. The idea that I could ever hate you, so completely..."
"You don't need my forgiveness," Mato spoke up, somewhat uncharacteristically. That seemed to be happening more these days. "You know you're beyond that. You know that I'll love you..." A finger brushed feather-light against the soft silk of Yomi's cheek. "...no matter what. Even if you hate me, I'll never stop loving you."
"I'm well past hating you, or myself," snipped the brunette, feeling a little warmth growing inside her again. "I'll never need that...that...monster, not ever again." Her gaze caught those brilliant cerulean eyes, and the rest, unspoken, floated between them.
Willing the reality-piercing aura from her vision, Mato felt the persona that was Black Rock Shooter disappearing beneath the surface once again, curling herself up into slumber deep within the recesses of the young girl's mind. The cool yet embarrassingly outlandish clothing gone, the long-enough-to-swing-by tails cropped short, and nothing but faint pale wisps to say where she had once been skewered through and through. She held her most treasured possession tightly against her own naked body, regardless of the bedsheet now heaped upon the floor and the coldness drifting in from an open window, the dark night sky looking down past the undrawn shades.
"No matter how many times I save you, I'll never stop needing her. There will never be a day when I won't want to protect you."
"She really has changed you," Yomi replied after what felt like too long. Her weight, hot and heavy and familiar flesh, settled against Mato's nakedness in such a reassuring way. Mato blushed again, much more prominently now, and for very different reasons.
"You changed me."
She couldn't say quite how long it was till the young bird in her arms was dozing peacefully, or till she followed suit. But she knew, inside and out, how long they would stay that way.