"Hallelujah." She whispered through the tears that ran down her face.
"What?" His lips were so close to hers she almost failed to answer him.
"Hallelujah." Eyes searching hers, he raised his fingers to her cheek,
"What?"
"Hallelujah." Her voice faltered on the notes, stumbling over the knot in her throat.
"Shh, it's okay." He was rocking her softly, trying to comfort the part that sang a song from long ago.
"I've seen your flag on the marble arch,
Love is not a victory march,
It's a cold and it's a broken hallelujah."
"Hallelujah," He joined her, fingers soft on her skin.
"Hallelujah…" She pushed away, away from him, towards the cold outside. She sang the rest of the words as her feet moved on the cold metal floor, it didn't matter that there would be cuts along the soles when the tears stopped falling for the foreign pain and began for the self-inflicted damage she was creating. The words faltered and fell with the droplets of moisture that left her eyes and plummeted into darkness, never echoing or causing ripples. The lights began to flicker on and she almost ran to her room, bare feet barely raising an echo in the fleeting darkness.
*~*
Nothing was said once they were together again and the time passed so quietly that there were no suspicions. It dropped into oblivion.
~*~
"Get them out!" He cried, voice hoarse with fear. The Operator's fingers flew over the keys as the remaining crew were freed from the dream world that almost claimed their lives that day. She was shaking, her composure shattered like a stain-glass window, lying in coloured fragments on the metal floor, falling through the gaps in the grated metal. He could do nothing, watching as the shards took the form of tears being fought in her eyes. She was gone before he could offer anything to repair the window he had always admired.
Her voice touched the darkness and for a moment he wondered what had pulled him from the depths of sleep. Softly as a mouse, he crept towards the galley, which was relatively soundproof. The catches in the melody, the frequent snatch breaths, made him realise the tears were falling thickly, even as she tried to stop them.
"It's not a cry you can hear at night,
It's not somebody who's seen the light,
It's a cold and it's a broken hallelujah.
Hallelujah,
Hallelujah,
Hallelujah." The last note died, covered with the sobs that had been withheld. For a moment he hesitated, a foot ready on the ladder rung. And then he was gone, back to his room where the pain of her tears could only cause him guilt and not agony.
*~*
Nothing was said once they were together again and the time passed so quietly that there were no suspicions. It dropped into oblivion.
~*~
"No one else ever heard her sing." He said over the cold blankets, hiding his true pain in that of grief. No eyes met his, no comfort was offered, none was asked for. He left them then, his mourning completed before the burial of her in the gardens.
And yet, one night years later, a lone figure knelt by the long ago grave.
"It's a cold and it's a broken hallelujah,
Hallelujah,
Hallelujah…" A tiny metal flower was pressed to the small stone given for her identification and the shadow rose, slowly tracing the way it had come.
*~*
Nothing was said once they were together again and the time passed so quietly that there were no suspicions. It dropped into oblivion. No more song, stain-glass window or covered slight form.
Hallelujah…
~*~ Fin ~*~