Promethean Blood - ch 10A-

Manga continuity: HyperNotes/V5 continuation fic

Deunan & Bri in a police drama in Olympus - Actiony smiting & swearing ahoy. some cuddles. A lot of shouting. typical appleseed fic (I hope)

All characters and themes are Masamune Shirow. This is just my take on how I wished unfinished-V5 might have gone...

BRIAREOS

Deunan looked as worn down as he felt, Briareos decided on letting himself into her room at the clinic. Stripped to the waist, her chest and waist all but encased in the flexible mesh of the bone-knitting machine, Deunan barely lifted her head to look at him on his arrival before letting it fall back again to rest against the wall where she sat propped. He internally winced at the cool welcome even as he crossed the room to absently collect her clothing from the heap on the chair, folding her borrowed coat into a tidier pile than she'd left it. He should have stopped by the locker-room first, he supposed, gotten her a change of clothing so that she wouldn't have to limp home in her torn boots. He'd go in a minute, he resolved - once he was certain she was alright. Chances were her treatment would take another hour at least. Would she even be good to drive? He made note to himself to call a cab. The last thing she needed was to have strangers oggling her bruises as she rode the bus back to their flat.

The silence between them stretched to an uncomfortable degree. He looked at her carefully, weighing his need to talk with her against her visible exhaustion and discomfort. It seemed best to just start slowly, he mustered his tattered confidence to broach the topic. "How are you feeling?"

"Like I've been thrown into a wall or three..." Deunan sighed. "Otherwise, I'm alright. You?"

He approached the side of her bed in order to brush a finger over the fading bruises on her cheek and jaw. The gel that the medics liked slathering such injuries in had done its work well. Washed clean of blood and liberally painted in the goop, Deunan's face was looking considerably less mauled than it had an hour ago. Her lip still looked scabbed and swollen from the cyborg's punches, but the grey-green bruises around her neck would likely clear up before morning.

"Status green." He offered, seeing how she was waiting for an answer. Seeing her sardonic nod in agreement, and subsequent wince as she bent her neck, he tried to make light of their less-than-excellent condition. "Otherwise, tired, hungry... burned out. You know. The usual."

"Yeah." His girl closed her eyes again, seeming to prefer resting while the machine worked its magic on her ribs. "I hear you."

"Deunan..." He let his fingers drop to her bare shoulder, wincing at the evidence that there were bruises there too. "I-"

"Please." She raised a hand to weakly ward him off. "Not here, ok? I think we've aired enough dirty laundry in public for one week, don't you?"

"I wasn't-" He hesitated to finish, not sure what he'd been intending to do, or say. "How much longer do they want to hold you here? Can I get you anything? Something to eat?"

"It's 3 AM in the morning, old man." Deunan pointed out candidly. "Nothing worth eating will be available. I'll be done as soon as this crap goes 'beep'. I'll just eat something at home. Get something for yourself if you want, but I'm good."

"A coffee at least? Tea?" He tried to encourage her.

"I'm good." She reiterated tiredly. "You can go home, you know. You don't need to wait for me."

"I'd rather stay." Briareos countered gently, not interested in eating if it meant leaving her alone again. A change of clothes could wait, he decided, they'd go to the lockers together when she was released. "They give you something for the pain at least?"

"Yeah." Deunan sighed again. "Look Bri- about earlier..."

"It'll keep." He reached out to touch her again, letting his fingers trail down her arm in sympathy, pausing at the scuffed and broken skin over her knuckles. "It's alright, girl."

"It's not alright." She disagreed, shaking her head slowly. "Nothing's right... this is all just so fucked up, baby and I don't even know-"

"We'll talk." Briareos cut her off before she could agitate herself further. One thing at a time he told himself. First they'd get her unstrapped from the damned machine, and cleared by the doctors, _then_ they'd try and apply some bandages to the other things broken between them. "We'll talk about it when we get home."

"Yeah. ok." Deunan grimaced expressively. Briareos pet her arm again, feeling comforted by the fact that she didn't pull away. Daring further still, he eased himself onto the bed beside her, inviting her, if she wanted, to slouch against him and get comfortable. His girl slid sideways along the wall until her cheek rested along his arm, eyes closing as she rested through the remainder of her therapy. Their trip home was a quiet one by mutual agreement.

Neither of them was terribly hungry when left with the fact that they'd have to _cook_ whatever they wanted to eat. There just wasn't any stamina for mucking about in the kitchen. Briareos hesitated to fix himself a drink, and then decided it could hardly make things worse and made the whiskey a double. Deunan waved off his silent offer of a glass, stepping around him to grab a shower and change from her wrinkled uniform to sweats. Her cat-suit, he noted, had found it's way to the trashcan on their way out of the locker room earlier. She hadn't bothered to bring the torn outfit home.

Taking his time in the kitchen as he listened to her rinsing and dressing upstairs. He tried to marshal his thoughts into something like a coherent proposal. The alcohol burned his throat on the way down, reminding him that as much as he wanted the liquor to settle his nerves he needed to keep his head clear for what was to come. The last thing he wanted was for them to have another round of shouting stupidity at each other. There had been enough of that already.

Briareos tilted his head, hearing the telltale sound of the upstairs balcony door slide back. Deunan wasn't coming back down? He glanced towards the window, acknowledging that it was no longer really dark out. The first hint of morning tinging the horizon. It hadn't been a particularly cold night, and some fresh air after the claustrophobic darkness of the club? Would be a welcome change. Filling a glass of water for his girl, Briareos mustered his courage and moved to join her.

He found Deunan sitting on the balcony, pretty much where he expected she'd be; curled on their small bench, looking out over the neighborhood. Her damp hair clung to her forehead as it dried, her loose t-shirt making her look even smaller than she was. He could feel her practically radiating exhaustion, and resignation. He sat down next to her with a soft sigh, passing her the cup he'd carried up for her.

"It's water." He clarified when she made a face at his offering. Deunan blinked and accepted it after a moment's hesitation.

"I thought..."

"It's fine." He waved off her vague apology. "I understand."

"You never let me finish what I'm trying to say." Deunan sighed, staring down at her water in chagrin. "You ever notice that?"

"Do I?" Briareos wondered aloud. He sighed again, slowly letting the wall take more of his weight as he slouched back in an echo of her pose. The whiskey was helping, supposed. The constant chase of his thoughts slowing a little thanks to the alcohol running through his system, letting him find a little space to breathe amidst all the frantic worry and stress of the past several days. "I hadn't noticed."

"Not like I have anything to say worth hearing anyway, right?" His girl's lips twisted upwards into an interpretation of a smile, but the expression just looked strange, and wrong. He shuttered his mechanical eyelids as he tried to make sense of her dark mood.

"Deunan...You know that's not true." Briareos tried to find a place to begin. "Look. It occurs to me, girl... that we've broken just about every rule we've ever made for each other in the past few weeks, hell... months, maybe." He shared his latest revelation to her as he watched the sky slowly change color.

Even for a cyborg, the bench wasn't remotely comfortable. He wondered how Deunan could stand it. They'd gotten the damned thing for free; another relic of Hitomi's, gifted to them when they'd moved away. But it was only after they'd set it out and tried it that they realized _why_ the bioroid had been so happy to part with it. Some how they'd talked several times about replacing the thing with proper chairs, but had never actually gotten around to it. There were a lot of things, he mused, that in the balance, they'd put off doing for too long, in trying to master the inherent insanity of life in Olympus.

Deunan said nothing to his comment, shifting to tuck her legs up so she could rest her elbows on her knees. Somehow her silence was worse than when she shouted and threw things. He rubbed his arm wondering at himself for the preference. It wasn't like he _liked_ when she flew off the handle for the stupidest reasons, but at least he knew how to cope her temper. This felt too much like she'd given up all together. If he wasn't even worth getting mad at anymore, he wasn't sure _what_ he could do to get through to her.

"Deunan..."

"I'm listening." She sighed bitterly. "What do you want me to say, 'no baby, everything's fine, don't worry'? I'm sorry, I'm just a little too tired right now to tell that one with a straight face. Try me tomorrow."

"Everything's _not_ fine." He disagreed. "You've been about five minutes from balling your eyes out all day, and I- I'm not..." He wasn't quite sure what he was trying to say, and so chose to just stop babbling.

Dawn was breaking over the neighborhood as they sat uselessly, birds out in full force, chirping in chorus across the various lawns and gardens. It was really pretty, he acknowledged, but it was pathetic that they were both sitting outside having this horribly awkward conversation when they ought to have been indoors, with curtains drawn, getting what sleep they could in their time off.

He exhaled and tried again, working through the mental script he'd loosely assembled during her shower. "Look. A long time ago, we promised each other a couple of things. Just basic, stupid shit, but things that we once thought were important. Stuff like, remembering to ask each other for help, when we needed it... and being open about things that weren't working between us. Not letting this relationship be something, just casual and shallow. Not taking it for granted."

"I remember."

Briareos shrugged, not able to tell from her expression whether the memory made her happy or sad. He turned his drink in his hands, watching the ice slowly melting. "Somehow. I think we've lost that. Not intentionally, just... that life got in the way of our old goals without us really noticing. And looking back, it seems to me that I can't remember the last time that we really _talked_, Deunan. I mean, about _important_ shit. About us. About life. About what we wanted to do, or be. Back in the badlands, maybe. Or when I was laid up when we first got here, but definitely not since then."

"We've been busy." She answered carefully, still not looking at anything in particular, stubbornly resisting his overture to unbend a little. "There were more important things to bitch about in the badlands. And here? Well... there just hasn't been much to say."

Briareos was suddenly reminded of her as a child, constantly waiting for the bad news that inevitably followed. He set his cup aside and reached out to catch her hand, tugging it away from her knees in favor of cupping it between his. God she was tiny. He marveled at her audacity, in choosing to stay with him all these years. She was truly fearless, for good or ill. That same trait that had scared him so much lately, had always been there in one form or another. Somehow it'd just become... twisted, like the rest of their dynamic. He firmed his resolve to _un-twist_ it, whatever the effort.

"You used to have so many plans, girl. Do you remember? You had a whole list of places we needed to visit... Stuff you wanted to do. Do you ever think about those things anymore?"

"Not really." Deunan shrugged, accepting the loss as a matter of course. "The war kinda fucked a lot of it up anyway. Half those places don't really exist anymore. Not the way they used to. And all the stuff I wanted to do? It was all in LA, or with people who're dead now. It wouldn't be the same."

"But, surely there are new things you want. I mean, more than just the latest pair of shoes, or a pay raise. Something a little more, I don't know... personal, I guess."

Deunan looked at him at last, mouth a tight line as she tried to understand the question inherent in his statement. After a long moment, she gave up with another shrug. "Not really. I have everything a person needs to get by. I mean... I've got food, shelter, employment, a little in the bank for splurges. What else is there?"

"Those are all things you need in order to live, girl. But what do you live _for_?" Briareos couldn't help but ask the question that had been nagging at him for a while now.

Every time she threw herself into the path of oncoming fire, in fact, the question would inevitably flash through his subconscious. Because he had a growing suspicion that somewhere along the way, in the army maybe, or in the badlands, maybe even in their transit to Olympus, she'd _lost_ it. Whatever reason she'd had. That indescribable _spark_ burning so brightly for as long as he'd known her had started to fade. Only it'd done so so gradually that he hadn't noticed at first, and even when he had? She'd still acted like herself most days. So he'd convinced himself that he was imagining it, until the next time she did something that made him genuinely wonder.

"What are you talking about." Deunan scolded him, seemingly annoyed by the idea that he was prying into something that really, lover or not, he had no business asking about.

It wasn't like he'd ever really understood her original reason for being the person she was. He understood quite a bit, he figured, about the way she ticked; her day-to-day needs and wants. But he'd always shied away from digging deeper, afraid to ask for such an intimate part of her when he knew he couldn't answer if she were to ask the same of him.

The sad thing, he realized, was that he'd recently come to an understanding of what drove _him_ to live. Maybe that was the root of the current problem. He finally had something he could share with her, something real, and honest. Only, he was now afraid he'd waited too long, and she'd stopped caring.

"Deunan, I know I've been frustrated with you a lot lately. And, I know I haven't expressed that frustration well. And god knows, when I've tried to talk to you about this, you always seem to hear exactly the opposite of what I'm trying to say... but I'm going to try again, alright? And this time, for my sake, would you please just listen to me? Don't just blow me off, but _listen_. And at the end, if you're still pissed then- fuck it, I'll stop harping on it. But at least we'll know where we stand. And if you're not pissed, and you want to tell me something - anything - that's been on your mind, then that's great too. Ok?"

Deunan turned her face so that she could rest her cheek on her knee and watch him at the same time. There were shadows under her eyes she was so tired but she nodded slowly just the same. "Sure. Knock yourself out."

Briareos found it easier to watch her fingers than to match that stare as he carefully chose his words. " You need to understand. When I'm angry with you... I'm, well -"

He closed his eyes and swore to himself that a little humiliation was nothing if it meant he wouldn't be watching her pack her belonging and moving out in the near future. "Some of the things you've been doing lately have scared the _shit_ out of me, Deunan, and I don't think you even realize it. You just jump into things without thinking and I freak out to the point where I just get so- and end up yelling at you about what you're doing, and not about why it bothers me, and I think- no, I _know_, that it's not helpful, to either of us. Like treating a symptom, and not the illness. I've wanted to talk to you about it for a while now... but I confess, I've been scared to do that too..."

Deunan was frowning at him as she puzzled out his meaning. He felt horribly exposed as he sat there letting her consider his confession. What would she do with the knowledge, he wondered. It'd be trivial for her to use his fears against him. Probably, he'd never win another fight for as long as they lived together. She'd hold all the cards. Not that she hadn't always, but she hadn't _known_ the power was hers to wield.

"What exactly are you afraid of?" She asked at last. "You say you're scared when I do things... And then say you're scared to tell me you're scared...? That's confusing. Also, unlikely."

"What, I'm not allowed to be afraid of things?" Briareos snorted, finding it easier to discuss the problem if he pretended they were both talking about someone else. "I'm afraid of all kinds of things, Deunan, some of them quite mundane. I'm afraid of spiders even, and that's down right average..."

Deunan shook her head. "You're not afraid of spiders. You don't _like_ them, but that's not the same thing. That's like me saying I'm afraid of tight spaces. I can deal with them just fine, I'm just not comfortable with being someplace I can't easily move around in. It's a control issue, not a phobia."

Briareos snorted again, amused by her continued denial that any of the considerable traumas she'd survived in her life could have left scars. Typical Deunan. Sadly she soon returned to considering the original topic of their conversation determined to make him sweat over it beneath his armor. "What are you afraid of, Bri?"

He'd been the one to broach the subject, Briareos sighed, there was no backing out now. Crossing his ankles, he studied her fingers, still loosely curled in his grip and surrendered the last crumbs of his pride. "I'm scared of losing you, girl. It'd be bad enough if you just got fed up at last and walked out. But one of these days Deunan, I swear you're going to get yourself killed just out of damned recklessness and it's going to be my fault."

The absolute silence from the woman sitting next to him made him want to cringe. Briareos fought the urge to laugh at himself, at the stupidity of the words as they hit the open air. "I don't- I don't think you realize, Deunan, how much I depend on you. How much I need-" He closed his eyes and told himself to shut up before he said something truly pathetic.

His cynical side was crying foul, telling him he was an idiot for even saying as much as he had. All she had to do, he mused, was make the connection that he couldn't really function, as a person, without her, and she would own him, utterly. How the hell had he let this happen? He marveled at his lack of self-preservation.

Determined that something good might come from his painful confession he tried to direct her attention back to the problem at hand. "When you go and do things, like running into potentially fatal toxic-clouds without a respirator, for example? I think to myself, 'This is it. Nobody can be that lucky. She's dead.' And I feel horrible. Truly horrible, girl. Like I can't breathe. Like in that minute, I can see every second of what the future would be like without you, and... it hurts. It's physically painful. Do you know that?"

She shook her head, eyes wide in silent amazement. He suppressed a fresh urge to laugh at himself. He'd finally found something to say to her that would strike her speechless. He patted her hand and let it go, choosing instead to rest his elbows on his knees and gather his thoughts by staring at the humble concrete of their balcony. He felt like he was having an out of body experience. Would he have been able to make a confession like this, he marveled, if not in the throws of extreme sleep deprivation and aided by a good strong lick of alcohol? Usually he had better self control. He wanted to just give up on the world a while; close his eyes and nap. But he wanted Deunan more. He wanted things back the way they used to be.

"I'm scared that telling you all of this will mess up what little normalcy is left between us." Briareos admitted the last of it, weirdly glad to have the confession off his chest. It was rather freeing, he decided, to get it out in the open, all the worries that had been nagging him for so long. "That you'll now second guess everything I say to you, wondering if I'm asking you to do things because it's the right thing to do, or because I'm just being selfish, and looking out for my own best interest."

"I'm scared that I need _you_ a lot more than you will ever need me." He shrugged, studying his hands, not able to bring himself to look at her and judge her reaction to his complete surrender.

She left him hanging in limbo for a long minute while she considered his words.

"Only you, tin-man, could ever decide that the best way to deal with the realization that you care whether someone lives or dies... was to never tell them for fear that they'd use it against you." Deunan summarized his internal-conflict remarkably well, for having only had a few moments to wrap her head around the sum and total of his folly. She sighed in audible frustration. "I don't know whether to kiss you, or punch you... honestly... you're such an idiot..."

"Do I get a vote?" He tried to make a joke of her tired declaration. The way she described it? She sounded as though she thought he was a complete coward. Briareos rested his forehead in his hands, conceding that he _hadn't_ been acting particularly 'brave' lately.

"No." Deunan stated flatly. "You don't."

She sighed again, shifting so as to stretch her legs out in front of her as she passed judgment on his inadequacies. "You know what I think, Briareos?"

Briareos had to laugh at that, huffing in chagrined amusement at his predicament. "No... I've pretty much come to the conclusion over the years, girl, that I seldom have any idea what you're thinking..."

Deunan snorted, joining him in cynical mirth. "Well, at least you're honest." She rested her weight on her hands, looking out at the sky.

"I can't help but think, handsome. That you don't trust me. I don't know that you've ever trusted me." She grimaced, seeming resigned to it. "Because if you did. You would _know_ that I wouldn't use something like that against you. That I _couldn't_."

She stood up with a noise of annoyance, leaning against the railing instead. "Damn it, Briareos! If you don't know by now how much I need you. How much I've always _needed_ you... Then you're the stupidest man alive. I swear to god. I _know_ I've told you so. So either you weren't listening, which pisses me off. Or you didn't believe me. Which pisses me off worse! Which is it?"

"People change, Deunan." He offered the weak defense. "You needed me as a child, for a while. But that was a long time ago. Back before-"

"If you say 'before I became a cyborg', so help me, I _will_ hit you." She cut him off, turning around to glare at him with her back resting against the rails. "When will you get it through that thick, stupid head of yours, that I don't give a shit about you being a fucking cyborg!"

"Maybe I do." He pointed out gently. "Besides, this isn't really about that, or at least, mostly not about that. Even you have to admit, you need me less now than ever, Deunan. I mean look at what you did tonight. You're better than I ever was. You're a natural. Do you know that? You just took down two cyborgs _alone_, girl. Do you have any idea how outrageous that is? I wouldn't have dared to pull a stunt like that in my _prime_, Deunan."

"You're in your prime now." She pointed out, finding humor in her own statement. "You're only thirty-seven, you know. You're not that old."

"I feel old." He admitted. "I'm only going to get older. Pretty soon, it's not going to be just theoretical anymore, Deunan. It's going to be a fact. Cyborg or not, I won't be able to keep up with you when you go charging in like a madwoman. I'll be too slow. Too late. I won't be there to catch you if you slip, and you'll die, wondering why the hell I wasn't where you needed me to be."

"Christ. That's what you think about before every mission?" Deunan crossed to stand in front of him, forcing him to look up and face her at last. Her expression was haunted. "Briareos... That's... not healthy."

"I know." He found he couldn't match her stare for long, "And for the record? I trust you as much as I trust anyone. So it's not that I don't trust you. I just am really _really_ bad, at showing it. Apparently."

"For a guy who claims to need me so much it hurts, you sure spend a lot of time pushing me away." She sighed, reaching out to run her fingers along his head and neck.

"I don't want to need you this much." He offered, wincing belatedly at how bad it sounded when said aloud.

Deunan let her hand drop, annoyed all over again. "Sorry to be such an inconvenience for you."

"Deunan..."

"No. It's fine. Forget it. You've made your position perfectly clear." Deunan snapped, turning back to the city. "I'm just one giant fucking burden for you! I get it! So why stick around if you're so miserable! There's nothing keeping you here. You can leave any time you want. You've always made sure of that, haven't you..."

"You're not a burden." He protested, reaching for her. Predictably, she shook him off. Briareos sighed, letting his hand fall, not wanting to push his luck. Stupid, he told himself, to finally get her to unbend a little only to stick his big foot in his mouth again. "I shouldn't have said that. I'm sorry. I didn't mean it like that."

"I think you did." Deunan slouched forward to rest her forehead on the railing. "I mean... let's face it. We both know you've been pissed at me lately. I take too many risks. I make bad decisions. I don't call for backup. I waste money buying stupid things. I'm a terrible cook. I dress like a tramp. I read juvenile magazines. I have shit taste in music. And all my friends are annoying. Please let me know if I'm missing one, it's hard to keep track with you barking at me every day. I do listen, you see... I'm a fuck up, and you're tired of me. It's ok. I can't blame you. If I were you I'd be tired of me too. This whole relationship bullshit has been my idea all along anyway, you were always just humoring me."

"You're not a fuck up, and I'm not pissed, and I haven't been _humoring_ you all this time." Briareos disagreed in growing concern. "I just as much told you so not two seconds ago, and you say _I_ never listen? I need you, and I want to _fix_ this thing between us, Deunan, but I don't know how!"

He shook his head. Typical that she'd only throw his complaints back at him. How was that fair? Then again, what in any of their recent conversations had been fair? They'd used to have real arguments, he reminded to himself. Actual arguments, with give and take, and one of them talking the other into a better understanding of the situation; those were something else that had also been lost over the years. He sighed feeling the urge to give up at the magnitude of the work ahead of them. "Do you even want to fix this? Or have you already decided you're done with me?"

Deunan simply stared at him again, expression haunted as she weighed his words. "What do you mean?"

"Say the word, girl." He offered, his cybernetics aching sympathetically with the very real sense of sickness rising from this still-organic core at the risk he was taking, the suddenly very real possibility that in trying to talk things through with her, he'd just made them exponentially worse. "If you're done, then I won't bother you anymore. Alright? I owe you that much. For everything I've put you through over the years. Say the word. And I'll go."

"What...?" She blinked at him again.

"I may be a cyborg, Deunan, but I'm not blind." He shrugged. "If you need some time... without me in your hair, well, I understand. Alright? I won't blame you for it."

"And you'd just... go?" She whispered harshly. "Just like that?"

"If that was what you wanted." He agreed defeated. "I never wanted to make you unhappy, girl. I still don't, so..."

"What do you want?" She rubbed her face with her hands. "God damn you, Briareos, just- for once in your life- can you be honest with me and tell me what you want? Instead of constantly deferring to me?"

"What I want doesn't matter." He disagreed. "Deunan..."

"It _does_ matter." She slapped her hands against the railing, suddenly furious. "Jesus, Bri! When you say what you want doesn't matter, do you know what that says to me? It says he doesn't fucking care, Deunan, so do whatever the hell you want, it's all the same to him so long as you quit your bitching. Is that what you're telling me?"

"No!" He blinked at the way she twisted his words back at him. 'That's not what I said at all!"

"Then what do you want?!" She cried in frustration.

"I want you to be happy!" Briareos barked back, feeling his temper rise to match hers. "I want you to be happy _with me_. I want you to stay alive long enough that we can be happy... together." He pressed his mouth closed around the unplanned declaration. So much for his promise to himself to not shout at her. Part of him couldn't help but see the humor in it. Somehow she always did manage to bring out the best and worst in him. Maybe the alcohol had been a bad idea after all.

His girl was staring at him again, any evidence of her quick temper gone, replaced by that tight, anxious, wide-eyed look she often got right before the tears started. He raised a hand to her in a vague attempt to offer comfort, but then hesitated, not having the slightest clue what to do that would help. "Deunan..."

"That's what you want?" She asked at last, her voice little better than a croak as she held herself just beyond his outstretched hand. "Really?"

"Well I mean-" He let his arm drop feeling utterly stupid as he studied the floor. There really wasn't anyway to sound less like an idiot at this point. He sighed.

"I want those things too." Deunan agreed softly. Looking up, he wasn't surprised to see her cheeks were wet as she crossed over to join him on the bench again. Leaning sideways into his arm, after a moment's hesitation, she sighed and wiped at her face in annoyance with her tears. "I want _us_ to be happy too, baby."

"Oh." He exhaled with a feeling of tenuous relief. The feel of her pressed against his side was so normal, so utterly undramatic, that it was physically jarring to relax at her touch after being keyed up for the worst for so much of their conversation. Briareos took another breath, trying to figure out just what had happened. Something in all the nonsense he'd been ranting had seemingly... helped? She wanted what he wanted. That was a good thing right? It was someplace to start. "Well. Good. That's good."