Baldur is a good girl. She deserves good things.


Faj EoE 4221, Atlantis, Atlantis

Her chest hurt. Not exactly a surprise. Baldur had seriously injured her shoulder during the battle for Atlantis a few years ago. Had just completely shattered the right side of her clavicle, part of her scapula and had chipped part of her spine. She'd never fight again with a chipped disc. It pained her too much to go through the motions at speed. At least she could still worship and her sparring partners knew to be gentle with her. Her entire right side hurt and she winced painfully while she was going over a report from a fellow Sengar in Apollo. She ended up hissing at the pain and stood up, shaking out her right arm. That just extrapolated the problem.

She left the room and shambled her way to the lift in the middle of the Embrace. She dialed it to take her down to the ground floor where she could walk down the block to the proeathan staffed hospital. The lift stopped to pick up another passenger and she stood upright. It was former Sengar Inti. She couldn't let him see her in pain. He glanced at her, looked her up and down, and looked straight ahead at the door. The lift stopped a few floors down and as Inti was leaving the big warrior looked back at her, "You should really take better care of yourself," he said and then the doors closed. Fucking annoying cryptic adult. Why were proeathan adults like that?

Baldur wasn't even a child but she still felt like one sometimes. She didn't feel the need to talk circles around people or be cryptic for no reason. It probably helped that she was around humans so much and they had no time for not saying what they meant. They appreciated her being straightforward, honest, and to the point. She knew Inti could be direct when needed but in casual conversation, he was just as bad as other adults and was cryptic as hell.

The lift didn't take on any other passengers and opened on the ground floor. "Oh, Baldur. I was just going up to see you," it was Thor. Most Ilythians had light brown skin but Thor's was very dark, nearly the same shade as his black hair he always wore the same way since she'd known him. A tight braid against one side of his scalp to keep his hair out of his face. The only lightness to him was his eyes. Even in the blue sight his eyes were light. Normally whenever she saw him she smiled. She and Thor had been sparring partners for a very long time before they'd gone to sleep. Today she did not smile.

"Not right now," she sighed and gently pushed past him.

"Is everything alright?" he asked, following after her. Baldur had a longer stride than Thor did and he had to hustle to keep up. She was always annoyed that for a woman she was too tall, even taller than many men. She wished she'd been born just a bit shorter so she wouldn't have stuck out so much for her height.

"I'm fine," she assured him.

"You sure? Your face says otherwise."

She grimaced. Thor could read her like a book. "Did you need something?"

"I just needed to speak to you about something," Thor was vague as could be, almost as vague as an adult. She didn't like to think of Thor like that. "Why are you going to the hospital?" she glanced over at him, he was blue sighted. "Are you not feeling well?"

"I just have a slight pain in my chest, nothing to worry about," she tried to soothe him. Thor still frowned deeply.

"It mustn't be slight if you're going to the hospital. You fought on a broken leg," Thor said.

"Yes well, I was desperate then. I am not desperate now," she tried to keep her voice calm and scowled at herself when it dropped a bit in tone. She hated when it did that too. It only did that when she was upset. Thor said nothing and just kept following her. She went into the hospital and was seen quickly. She was Sengar of the Hedren, the stadalla was her Ando, and she was a member of the Fold. She was seen immediately. Thor managed to worm his way after her and stood outside the doctor's office.

The doctor checked her over. They placed their hands across her chest and spine before, to her great surprise, brought in a human. "What are they doing here?" she asked the doctor.

"They used to help me in Apollo," the doctor said. The human just stood by the side but said nothing. Baldur wondered if they could even understand what they were saying. They didn't look afraid, nor did they bear the slave collar.

"They're free, right?" she made sure.

"Oh, yes. Of course," the doctor nodded. "After the stadalla touched us all some humans immediately showed psionic aptitude, I fostered hers," the doctor smiled at the human and the human smiled back.

"Oh. Well, what are they going to do?"

"Make you feel better," the doctor assured her. "She's going to take your hand and you're going to relax, Sengar. When you come back to focus you'll feel better."

"Okay?" Baldur was confused but when the human came forward she offered a hand to her. She watched the human's eyes go completely black in an instant and a moment later Baldur developed a slow, wide, smile. The pain was lifted and she slouched back against the chair she was sitting in. She felt no more pain. It was some sort of empathetic healing or comfort sharing. She wasn't sure. It was somehow able to ease the pain at the least. She rubbed her upper chest where the pain had been located but there was no pain now. It lasted only a few seconds, felt longer, and then the human let go of her hand. "Wow," she breathed.

The doctor grinned, "Yes. It's quite something what humans can do," they beamed at their assistant. "It's amazing the type of pain humans can tolerate. She gave you her tolerance."

"They can do that?" Baldur's eyes were wide.

"She can."

"Oh, I have to ask Desmond about that," she said, mostly to herself.

"Who?"

"Oh… uh, a friend," she just said casually like she wasn't on first name terms with the stadalla. He was one of her sparring partners and even if she couldn't always fight back she was good at defending and let him try to beat the shit out of her when he got frustrated with old proeathans. She didn't blame him at all. "So I'm all set then? How long will this feeling last?"

"A while. Feel free to come back. It's a non-addictive pain suppressor for us so don't feel like you can't come back."

"Can she do that with other humans?"

He chuckled. "Humans already have that pain tolerance. She'd be sharing nothing of use to them."

"Wow," Baldur said, wide-eyed. She had no idea humans were so good at handling pain. She knew proeathans weren't the best and changes in pressure could cause discomfort to them thanks to the size and scope of their brains but humans could just shrug off her sort of chest pain? It must have been insignificant to them. The greatest pain in her life was when she'd kicked Sengar Od with her broken leg and she'd only stayed awake on stubborn will to win and adrenaline.

"Yes. They're very helpful. Now I think that's it. Have a nice day," and the doctor quickly left with his human assassinate in tow. Baldur followed after them and she found Thor right where she'd left him.

"You're feeling better?" he asked her.

"Yes," she said with a smile. "I feel a lot better. Let's get out of here," he followed dutifully. Once they were out of the hospital she turned to Thor as they walked, "What did you want to talk to me about?"

"Mmm, may we sit in the park?" he asked her.

"So I take it isn't secret?"

"Well… it is but I think it's better shared now," he said.

"Hmm, very well," she said and they found a shady place to sit under a tree. Some of the plantation kids were out under the watchful eye of a few adult proeathans and they ran around the park like excitable dragonflies, yelling and playing tag. She eased herself to the ground carefully. She had to be careful because of her back. "So what is it?" she asked Thor.

"You're my favorite sparring partner, you know?" Thor asked her.

She snorted, "You just say that because I can't beat you anymore," she teased him and he grinned back at her.

"Okay that might have something to do with it," he admitted. "But that isn't the only reason. You're so strong and brave and you get things done. You're friends with the stadalla even," he sounded like he couldn't believe it even as he said it. It was pretty crazy, to say she was friends with the stadalla. She, and Thor really, had gotten even close to him the past few months after his child had been born. Desmond needed someone to act as his voice and that fell to his Sengars so she and Od were often in Desmond's home discussing things while he did… normal parent things. It was so bizarre to her to see the savior of the world and the builder of Atlantis hold a baby in his arm while talking about matters of state or excuse himself because his baby was crying. Baldur had taken to bringing Thor with her now as an extra set of hands because sometimes there were poop explosions and Thor was way more level-headed than any of them and if Lucy wasn't around he was the only one who wouldn't panic and just put the baby in a sink full of water while the rest of them cleaned up the mess. It was a surreal experience to be Desmond's friend and be someone you considered a god. But they also wiped a baby's ass and changed their diaper like a normal person. Sometimes Baldur was sure she was having a fever dream in stasis still.

"Yeah, that's crazy to think about," she agreed with a shocked roll of her eyes.

"And I just… I've been thinking about some things. And it's been more in the front of my mind lately since we've been going and seeing Desmond and his family." Baldur didn't know where this was going. She just gave him a confused look. He didn't look nervous and she didn't expect him to be even if he was. Thor was always a bit of stability in a chaotic situation. Funny that since Desmond told her Thor was the name of a god of storms to humans. Probably because the last Hoda before they'd gone into stasis had been named Thor and he'd been an absolute nightmare and brewed chaos which went against everything the Ilythians stood for. Their new Hoda was much better and held the ideals of the Ilythians with more conviction than Hoda Thor had. "I'd like to learn to sword dance with you," he said.

Baldur blinked. She wasn't sure she'd heard that right. In Ilythian weddings, the couple had a choreographed fight with hollow swords that made different tones depending on where they struck. It was to represent the last fight they'd ever have since you shouldn't fight someone you were married to but instead of a loss, the wedding sword fight was to be the last time the two were against each other and instead they would only fight with each other in unison. "I— uh—" she wasn't sure how to respond to that. "Did I hear that right?"

Thor grinned, "Yes," he said. "Are you alright, Baldur? Is your chest pain back?"

"No. I'm fine. I just… why would you want to learn to sword dance with me?" she asked.

"Why wouldn't I?" he asked.

"You know my luck is misaligned, right?" she asked him again.

"So? You're still the best female fighter I know. And you're my friend. And you're beautiful too."

"Are you playing a prank on me, Thor? Because if you are I don't appreciate it," Baldur said. It wouldn't be the first time either and the last time it had happened she'd beaten them down so they wouldn't even meet her eyes. They hadn't made it into stasis.

Thor's eyes were wide, "What? No. Never," he insisted.

"No one says that about me."

"I do," he said. "And I don't really care that you're not luck aligned."

"You know our species should be more worried about procreation than feelings right now," she said callously. "After what happened."

"They made thousands of humans in the Seed Bank. If they really wanted to raise our population they could do that to us," Thor said and Baldur was genuinely shocked he'd say that. "We're all going to die. I'd rather be with someone who makes me happy than someone who will just make children. You're my favorite sparring partner. I would be lesser without you."

Baldur wasn't sure what to think about all of this. She'd never had someone seriously interested in her. She was always a fun experiment or she was lonely. It wasn't usually a joke but it was never serious. Like serious like Thor was serious. She used to like Thor when they were younger but he was so… upstanding and respected both before and after they joined the Hedren. She knew he was way out of her league despite them being friends for so long. Baldur hadn't even been anything before she'd challenged Od to a fight. If anything Thor had been higher ranked than her. Not that he'd have ever fought her because he knew she'd beat him and Thor was smart. He didn't pick fights he couldn't win. He didn't say things he didn't mean.

"I would be lesser without you as well," she said. He reached over and grabbed her hand. "You really don't care my luck isn't aligned?" she asked him.

"Not even a little," he said and leaned over a little. "Do you mind if I kiss you?"

"No," she said and closed her eyes when he leaned the rest of the way in and kissed her. Her chest sort of hurt again but in a strange, good, way. She'd gladly live with it.


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