Laura S. Arseid felt like a rock.

After two weeks without training, stretching, or any sort of stimulation, really, her muscles protested at the substantial weight of her weapon. The amount of effort it took to make a simple downward swing, let alone lift her sword to a sufficient height beforehand, frustrated her. How could she have let herself neglect her training for this long?

"Thought I'd find you here. But you shouldn't have gone out by yourself."

Laura let out a loud groan before collapsing to the ground. "I hate to say it, but you're right. I'm even slower and weaker than when I was a student. That's pretty depressing. I should have asked you to come along, Fie."

It was hard not to feel safe in Trista, even if the threat of the miasma loomed over everyone the moment they stepped outside. The atmosphere wasn't always as oppressive as it had been that first night, and today was a day when the weather seemed to want to fool you into thinking the advent of the Great Twilight had been nothing more than a bad dream.

"Well, I'm here now." Fie knelt down next to Laura and held out her hand. "If you want to continue, we could have a little training session."

Laura smiled at her partner and nodded. "You braided your hair, I see. It looks nice on you."

Fie returned the smile as she helped Laura to her feet. "Thanks. I felt like a change. It's pretty clear that you did, too."

As they trained together, Laura remembered the time they had crossed blades at nighttime in Heimdallr. Fie's improvement since those days was evident in her increased agility, along with a series of acrobatic maneuvers that made Laura's head spin.

But Laura was not one to give up easily. As she paid less attention to getting her old strength back, and more attention to being a worthy opponent for Fie, she found that her muscles quickly adapted to the techniques her body had repeated many times over.

For the first time in two weeks, she felt alive again.

By the time they were finished, it was close to nine o'clock, and the sun was going down.

"We should have started earlier," Laura said as the two of them sat on a bench. Several buildings had turned on their indoor lights, and the streetlamps were lit up as well. "But this is nice, in its own way. I haven't seen Trista at night in a long time."

"Anything else I can do for you?" Fie asked.

Laura looked at her. Fie's expression was mostly the same as normal, her lips turned up in a little smile—something that most people would call a "smirk," probably. But her eyes were earnest, and maybe even a bit concerned. "Well, you could put your head in my lap and let me touch your hair."

"That sounds more like a favor to me, but sure." Fie lay down with her head on Laura's thighs. "I just seem to have one of those pet-able heads. Rean still does it sometimes."

"Rean pets everyone's heads." Laura ran Fie's silver-white braid through her hand. "I guess I'm the same way. I like to stroke everyone's hair—especially hair that has a unique color to it. Elliot's, Machias', Jusis', Emma's…"

"Jusis is a blond, and Elliot is a redhead. Their hair isn't that unique."

"No. But it's too soft and pretty to not want to touch." Laura sat in silence for several moments. "I am having a hard time with moving on from Father's and Millium's deaths."

Fie, who had closed her eyes in contentment, opened them again. "Laura, I don't think many people 'move on' after just a couple of weeks. Not when they lose someone as close to them as your dad was to you. I mean, I lost the man who was a dad to me. I know what it's like."

"But…" Laura stared off into the distance, taking in the pink and purple hues of the evening sky. "You had to grieve alone, did you not? I have all of you."

"I had Sara."

"Oh. Of course." Laura grew quiet again. Then: "Do you ever wonder what happened to Sir Rutger and Crow after they died? If they went to heaven, or if they just ceased to exist?"

"…I do." A bit of sadness had crept into Fie's voice. "I've thought of asking Crow about it. But I'm afraid of the answer. And I'm afraid that if the answer is the second one, it will hurt Crow to tell me. I don't want to make things hard for him."

Laura turned to look at her sword, which she had leaned against the back of the bench. There were so many tiny scars etched into its surface—memories of the battles she had fought. "I didn't want to train. Even today, I didn't start to enjoy it until after I started training with you. It all felt so pointless.

"Do you remember when we went to Garrelia Fortress the first time? All of us, except Millium and Crow, were depressed because all of our weapons and education meant nothing in the face of weapons like the Achtzehn tanks and the railway guns." Her hand stopped moving over Fie's hair. "Of course, we would eventually learn that there were things we could do, even if other people were going to use weapons of mass destruction. But I felt that same sense of powerlessness in the days following Father's—no, the truth is that I still do."

"Hey. Pet me again," Fie demanded.

Laura chuckled and did as she was told. "Rean's own resolution to recover his strength inspired me to do the same, you know. But this morning, all that inspiration was gone, and it was so frustrating. I became angry with myself. Rean has been through so much—"

"We've all experienced loss in our lives, Laura. We know how it is. And we don't expect you to deal with it any better than we did. There's no shame in having a day where you feel you can't do anything."

"I guess so." A prickling sensation formed in her eyes, and she smiled bitterly as she recognized the telltale sign of tears. "Maybe I'm not slower or weaker than I was as a student. Maybe today is just one of those days."

"Of course you're not slower or weaker. I would have run circles around you if that were the case." Fie reached up and held her hand against Laura's cheek. "But I guess I can see why you felt that way at first. You don't skip training often, do you?"

"I haven't missed a single day for as long as I can remember." Laura took Fie's hand in hers and kissed it. "I've missed being with you like this, Fie."

Fie sat up, and Laura put her arm around Fie's shoulders. Together, they watched as the sun continued to set.

"People always talk about the sunset." The sleepiness in Fie's voice made Laura smile. "About how pretty the colors are. But I prefer to focus on things that people don't usually think about. Like how the shadows move and fade into the background as it gets darker. And how the scent of the air changes. How the daytime animals fall quiet, and the nighttime animals start making sounds."

"You mentioned once that jaegers are at their best in the dark," Laura said as Fie rested her head on her shoulder. "Do you feel most comfortable at night, Fie?"

"Not necessarily the most comfortable." Fie hesitated. "But…yeah, the night has a certain level of comfort for me. It wasn't always this way. When I was little, I was afraid of the dark. But once the boss took me in, he made sure that there was always someone with me at night. Whoever it was would tell me stories, sing to me, wrap me in a blanket and make sure I was comfortable." Some nearby frogs began their evening chorus, and she smiled. "Day and night, like the seasons, are just part of the many cycles of life. When I'm afraid of what's ahead, or feel alone, I tell myself, 'Let evening come.'"

"That's a nice thought." Laura began playing with Fie's hair again. "Where did you hear it?"

"It was in a book of poems Leo gave me for my thirteenth birthday. I still have it."

"'Let evening come.'" The sun had now fallen below the horizon, filling the sky with its mesmerizing twilight hues. Fie had been right about the sounds—they were completely different. Laura wondered how she had spent twenty years without noticing. "Those words alone seem to address so many more things than just the coming of the night."

"I agree." Fie stood and kissed Laura in a way that made Laura's insides flutter. Fie was usually a bit aggressive with her kisses, her teeth teasing Laura's lips with a gentle bite, or her tongue brushing against the roof of Laura's mouth, creating a tickling sensation that made Laura squirm. This time, however, the kiss was sweet, soft. Comforting.

When their lips parted, Laura stood up and put her arms around Fie. "Thank you," she whispered. "Let's go inside now. I'll make us tea and something to eat."

Let evening come.

Laura would have to ask Fie to show her that book some time.