For the next few minutes, they danced in silence, Magna relinquishing the role of leading without a word.

It felt like an offering.

A yielding of control.

Or maybe Yumiko was just reading too much into it.

(and apparently, she wasn't the only one)

On their next turn, she was confronted by the sight of Tomi giving her a not so subtle thumbs up. With both hands.

Considering how tense things had been between them lately, the gesture was more than a little bit of a shock.

Enough of one that she couldn't help but pause. Stare.

And in doing so bring Magna's attention to the source of that stare.

"I see your brother's still my biggest fan."

Yumiko heard the edge of bemusement to her tone, possibly even bewilderment. They'd only met the once before everything ended and Magna had been as confused then as she was now by his apparent endorsement of their relationship - though that likely also had something to do with the fact that, back then, there hadn't even been a relationship to endorse.

Yumiko's mouth curved. "He's always thought you were a good influence on me."

"So he has a few screws loose is what you're saying?"

She chuckled. "No. But apparently I can be a little uptight. Need someone to shake me up a bit."

Magna snorted. "Is that what he said?"

"The exact words."

Minus a few other. . . less than flattering ones.

"How does he explain the time you got arrested then?"

Yumiko held up a finger. "That was for a good cause."

"Uh huh." Magna smiled slightly before shaking her head. "Honestly, I think he'd just be happy to see you with anyone who wasn't that bitch."

She couldn't quite suppress a grin. "Her name was Nicole."

Magna shrugged. "Bitch fits better."

Yumiko couldn't disagree.

But she didn't want to talk about Nicole. Not now. Not here.

Especially when the tension between them seemed to finally be abating.

Lowering her hand, she returned it to Magna's shoulder, feeling the heat of her skin through the course material - and experiencing a brief, inflexible surge of frustration at the barrier. "You're right about him thinking anyone would be a step up from Nicole. But wrong about that being the only reason he likes you."

"It's the tattoos, isn't it? Everyone gets weak for those."

Yumiko rolled her eyes but couldn't help the upturn of her lips at noting the smug look on her face. "Sure. It's the tattoos."

"Thought so." After a moment, Magna's smirk faded and she could see the faint traces of uncertainty creep in. "Did you tell him?"

"Tell him what?"

"You know. What I did."

Yumiko tried not to tense, shook her head. "No. No, that's not my secret to tell."

"Considering it involves me hurting you, I'd say it is."

Another thing she didn't want to talk about right now. That brief exchange earlier had been more than enough.

"I'm not going to tell anyone, Magna. Especially not anyone here."

Not even her brother.

She didn't want to know what the Commonwealth might do if they found out they had someone who'd been released from prison far too early in their midst. Someone who'd been a murderer in the old world, before the collapse of society had forced that quality out of the rest of them. Especially considering how civilized this place prided itself on being.

She suspected Magna's status would become even more dismal than it was now.

Yumiko might not be able to advance that status, at least not yet, but she could still protect her. Or try to.

No-one was going to find out about Magna's past.

No-one.

She felt a hand move down her back, to her waist. "You know. . . you're uptight. You've just always been selective when it comes to the things you get loose about. You've never cared about bending or breaking the rules if it's what's right. No matter how much you love rules." Magna's mouth twisted teasingly. "It's one of the things I lo- like about you."

Yumiko's heart clenched at the slip and she closed her eyes. "Can we not do that?"

"Do what?"

"Pretend that we don't love each other." The fingers at her waist dug in infinitesimally. She opened her eyes. "I still love you, and I hope that you still love me too?"

It was a fact she couldn't bear to dance around. Didn't have the energy to. Or the heart.

Magna held her gaze for a long time and Yumiko wished she could read what she was thinking. Feeling. But that had always been difficult, even before this distance supplanted itself between them. "Not the kind of thing I could stop even if I wanted to."

The confirmation wasn't as reassuring as she'd thought it would be.

"Do you?"

"What?"

Yumiko tightened her grip. "Want to?"

Magna said nothing, fingers stiff against her. "It would certainly be easier."

A blatant copout.

"You've never done easy. Not once in your life."

"I know." She shrugged. "It's one of those new things I'm trying out. Maybe I should do easy. Maybe that's what I need."

"You mean instead of me."

But Magna shook her head, fingers clenching a moment. "Stop it. I'll always need you."

"But you'd rather that wasn't true."

The statement made her pause, the rhythm of their dance tripping up, snagging. Yumiko doubted anyone watching would notice but she felt the change. Felt it in the hardening of Magna's form against her, saw it in the vulnerability of her eyes. The sudden uncertainty.

"I. . ."

It shouldn't hurt.

She'd known for years that Magna would have preferred not to love her, not to feel even half as much for her as she did.

To need her.

And Yumiko knew that it wasn't about her. Had never been about her. That there were some heavy defense mechanisms set up around Magna's heart and she'd tripped almost all of them in her efforts to get inside.

But those defenses hadn't kept her out.

Hadn't kept this thing between them from growing and growing - so far past the point of control. Either of their control.

She could remember that tipsy conversation from years ago, where Magna's fear around the concept of falling in love had clumsily tumbled out. Along with her conviction that she could choose. Choose who she fell in love with, whether she even fell in love with anyone at all.

The conversation had both exasperated and amused Yumiko at the time.

Now it only hurt.

Filled her with a tired kind of defeat.

Magna had never wanted to love her.

Because loving her was dangerous.

It wasn't something Yumiko could change. Perhaps wasn't even something that she should want to. But she did.

She wanted Magna to want to love her.

Not just to surrender to the inevitability of emotion. Like a kingdom fallen to siege.

A battle lost.

She didn't want their love to be a war. Or something that Magna fell victim to, rather than embraced.

A matter of defeat.

Loss.

That wasn't how Yumiko felt about loving her. How she'd ever felt. Even after everything, she would never relinquish that love. Never choose to, if the choice was given.

She wanted to love Magna.

Even if it was hard.

Even if it hurt.

Even if nothing ever came of it.

Yumiko wanted to love her.

And after thirteen years she'd thought that maybe Magna might want to love her too.

Apparently, that had been too much to hope for.

Yumiko sighed. "I know you don't want to love me. That you never have."

"You know that, huh?"

She nodded. "And I get it. I do."

But it still hurt.

Magna's expression was unreadable, eyes hinting at. . . something.

Something that she couldn't put a finger on.

"You assume a lot, you know that? Always have."

Yumiko narrowed her eyes. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, you assumed I was innocent thirteen years ago, even though I never told you that. And the assumptions haven't stopped since."

She bit the inside of her cheek. Tasted blood. "You say that like you haven't spent all of those thirteen years doing the same when it comes to me. The most glaring example being that you assumed I wouldn't still love you if I knew the truth. That I would leave."

And the pain - the betrayal - that had been caused by that assumption wasn't something Yumiko was sure she'd ever entirely be able to move past.

Thirteen years. . .

A lie.

Magna paused before giving a slow nod. "You're right."

She blinked at the easy acknowledgment. "I'm sorry, can you say that again?"

"Miko. . ."

"In writing, preferably."

Magna rolled her eyes, glancing away. "Stop."

"No, I'm serious," Yumiko said, an unexpected smile teasing her lips. "You admitting that you're wrong is such a rare event it only happens once in a century."

Only now it had happened twice in three months.

"Hey, I didn't admit I was wrong. Just that you were right."

"Another thing that never happens."

"And something that will never happen again if you continue to make a big deal out of it."

Yumiko pressed her lips together, swallowing her grin.

They danced in silence for a moment, Magna watching her suspiciously.

She held her tongue.

A beat passed.

Followed by several more.

Slowly Magna's expression began to relax, suspicion easing.

One.

Two.

Three.

The grip on Yumiko's waist loosened-

"I'm still going to need that in writing."

Beat.

"For legal purposes."

Magna groaned, throwing her head back. "Fucking lawyers."

Just going to warn you guys that I am completely at the mercy of my hormones when it comes to writing. I have PMDD which has gotten REALLY bad in the last year so for about two-three weeks my brain fog gets amped up so bad it can be absolutely impossible for me to read or write. I tend to get about a week where things ease off a bit (at least by my standards), which was this week. I think I have a day or two left and then everything is going to be up in the air. I'm trying to get as much out as I can before that time hits but I honestly don't know how things are going to be. I'd say that it'll probably be another month before this fic is completed because I'll have to wait for that week to come around again, which is really frustrating because I'm kind of desperate to complete this fic before new episodes with magna and Yumiko air and contradict everything I've written.

Anyway, this is one of the reasons why updates on my fics have slowed down so much. Because I rely so much on that single week and for the last five months something has always happened during it (like massive migraine, not getting more than two hours sleep a night, etc) which ruins the whole 'not having as much brain fog' thing. It's. . . very frustrating. Especially since writing is one of the only things that brings me joy anymore.

But yeah just thought I'd give you guys a heads up.