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It was sunny when she left.
It felt wrong, having her Warrior leave her and the sun was shining bright, it should have been raining as she walked out of her life for who knows how long.
Wuk Lamat couldn't stand to watch her leave though, and left before she walked off with the rest of her Scions. She needed to excuse herself, not wanting to cry like a child throwing a temper tantrum because she didn't get what she wanted, getting who she-
So she pretended. Pretended that she had to check over the stalls in the market (Naoto helped the supply issues with all of them), pretended she needed to pick up some tacos (Naoto always got the hottest ones), pretended she needed to help with moving boxes from the port (just like she would catch Naoto doing whenever she had free time). Strangely enough none of it helped to distract from the hole in her chest, feeling the pain of it like an open wound slowly bleeding.
She wasn't doing this because she was listless, though. She had a plan that needed executing, and just needed to be in the right headspace to do so as well as the right time to do it in. So she occupied herself with the tasks she expected a Dawnservant should do, helping solve disputes, making sure the people were cared for, played a new ball game with the kids they just invented this morning, things like that.
Once she saw the sun had risen in the sky to nearly midday, any further delays would just be stalling on her part so she started making her way down the steps; a very familiar destination in mind. A strange trepidation pulled at her, weighing her down and making her feel sluggish, but that did little to stall her progress. She could handle this, she handled worse after all.
She can almost feel a groove where she walked as she finally arrived in front of For'ard Cabins as she greeted its proprietor.
"Good morning Peshekwa, how are you today?"
"Ah, good morning Dawnservant! It's always such a pleasure to see you."
It wouldn't take much to convey why she was here, the kind lady in front of her was already aware of her plans after all. But for some reason, maybe a cowardice, stalled her tongue. She annoyed herself with her own hesitation. All the progress she's made since first setting out for Old Sharlayan feels like it all left her in the moment, as though Naoto took it back when she was done letting the Vow borrow it for a short while.
Peshekwa wasn't paralyzed by such sentiment though, and took her hesitation as though Wuk was saying what they already discussed before with that regular effortless grace of hers, Peshekwa responds.
"I was wondering if you might be available to help me with something, perhaps? We were planning on clearing out a few empty cabins today after some vacancies, but one of our cleaning crew is out with a cold, so one cabin's cleaning is being delayed. I wouldn't need you to clean anything of course, far be it from me to have the Dawnservant scrubbing floors! Maybe just check over the cabin? You know, make sure there isn't any damage done that needs repairs, look for items that were left behind, that sort of thing."
If she didn't know any better, Lamat would think Peshekwa had spent her downtime playing those games with Naoto, the way she could talk around things so convincingly. Not at all like herself, too direct to ever enjoy those kinds of word games.
"Sure, I'd be glad to help! Which cabin needs looking over?"
So there she was once again, in a cabin that smelled like gunpowder and lilacs. A room completely devoid of sound, the orchestrion having gone quiet now that it's previous owner took the sheet music out. For the first time ever, the gentle breeze cooling the room frustrated the Vow of Resolve, knowing that even if she got her wish to have the room stay vacant for her guest, that it would still eventually lose even that small tie back to that short girl who changed her entire life for the better; the scent of her hhetsarro would eventually be lost.
She can't get lost in that sentiment though, she came here with purpose. So Wuk walked through the cabin, dutifully checking for damage, throwing out some small things here and there, gathered her prize, and began her walk back out down the docks. In and out in probably quarter bell at most. It's not as though her Warrior would have left a mess of the place after all, she always was shockingly gentle with the world around her, as though she wanted to apologize for some unseen slight of existing. If it wasn't for the scent itself you would hardly know that such an unassuming cabin was being used by anyone at all.
Feeling a little better being back under the gentle heat from the sun overhead, Wuk Lamat went to go thank Peshekwa again for being so understanding and also, so very discreet. It's embarrassing enough to have to ask about this without having to worry if anyone else would have found out about what her purpose on the docks was today.
But with her approach back to Peshekwa's stand, the proprietor looked stricken. As she made eye contact, a thin sheen of sweat marred her usually spotless face as she tries to shake her head 'no' to the tall Xbr'aal. What in the world...? Worried something might have gone wrong, she moved just that little bit faster so she could ask what's happened.
Only in crossing the pillar supporting her stand closest to the waterfront did she realize what had gone wrong for the woman. Just out of the corner of her eye, Wuk saw a shock of blue hiding inconspicuously behind the pillar, a razor sharp pair of fangs glinting in a smile that stretched ear to ear.
Oh hells.
A stutter step back, arms bolt to hide her prize behind her back, no time or thought spared to doing so covertly. Impossibly, her companion's smile widened for an instant before it drops off entirely, mischief lost from every part of her expression except in her eyes. She tilts her head in an almost innocent expression of confusion before she speaks.
"Hey there Lamaty'i, whatcha got there?" She takes a step closer, making Wuk feel like she was burning alive by the heat from her dear friend and the sun alike. She couldn't answer that, not to her. She needed any distraction at all, and the best she could come up with is...
"Hiya Naoty'i, I uh, thought you were leaving?"
It wasn't a very good distraction.
The Gunbreaker takes another step closer, and to avoid simply bursting into flames there on the dock, the Intrepid had no choice but to take a step back. "I had some other more personal business to attend to. Plus I felt our goodbye wasn't... personal enough, you know? Like we wouldn't leave it on a handshake right?" Despite knowing there was mischief afoot, the second half of her statement rang true. The goodbye on the docks couldn't convey everything either of them wanted to say, both agreeing beforehand that the knowledge of the more intimate part of their relationship is best kept under wraps. Better no one know the two were like that with each other, knowing the friction that could cause if it were to come to light to anyone.
Well, anyone besides Koana, who would and had mercifully kept quiet about what he saw that night.
Naoto took yet another step forward, and so Wuk took another step back. Before she could even try and address her partner again, Naoto interrupts, though her expression drops the impishness as she gets really serious and states plainly. "If you take one more step back you're going to fall into the ocean and you'll dunk my pillows in salt water."
!
"Er, pillows? I don't know what you're talking about." The Intrepid does her best to mask what she's done, though even with how badly she was at lying, Naoto is quick to refute the point by yet again teaching her something new.
"Hhetsarro noses are only a little weaker than a Xb'raal's, you know."
Breathing in, she smells the scent of Naoto from in front of her and behind and it, at the very least, calms her just a bit. If she could smell it so keenly, then there's little doubt Naoto could be fooled at all. She exhales her held breath and hangs her head, accepting another addition to her loss column.
"I didn't know that, actually..."
With nothing left to hide, she lets her hands fall to her sides, a pillow that carries her friend's scent held in each.
It was the night they spent together after losing her spar where she realized how calm Naoty'i could make her, an odd contradiction considering how hard her heart hammered otherwise when in her proximity. It hadn't taken too much longer after that to find out that the scent itself could illicit that when she walked through the market and saw a flower shop handling a machinist patron, the smells combining to almost be right. So she figured since she didn't know how long she'd go without having her warrior in her life, then she would at least like some manner of consolation prize. She deserved that much, didn't she?
The silence between them stretches for a single moment as Naoto has a look on her face that was hard to discern as her brow furrowed in thought. Coming to some conclusion about what course of action to take on this, she addresses her Lamaty'i. "Here, walk with me." Taking a pillow from Lamaty'i's grip and offering her own hand in its place, the Xbr'aal is quick to take her hand in hers. So small, it felt like the hand of a child and not the hand of an honest to gods hero who saved her life in so many ways. Naoto took off walking towards the steps leading up from the docks and begins what sounds like yet another lesson from master to student.
"I hope you understand that unless the very sky is falling or the planet's exploding or some such, that all that prevents me from returning to Tural-" she turns to look back at the taller woman, still towering over her despite being several steps below her. "-returning to you can be thrown to the wind with a single linkpearl call."
Lamaty'i knows this, of course. This exact conversation has happened at least twice before, and most assuredly wouldn't be the final time either. She believes she should be able to stand on her own, Naoto believes reaching out is an important act for anyone to learn, so Wuk counters that she monopolizes her time enough already, and so the Gunbreaker rebuts that there isn't a person alive that could force her to do something she doesn't want to. Two iron wills clashing with each other, both too stubborn to admit they could be wrong.
Well, at least one refusing to admit that, in any case.
They've made it up about half the stairs before Lamat realizes she's being lead to the palace before Naoto continues on.
"For as long as I draw breath, the very least that I am to you is an ally. I'd like to think I'm more than that as well, but far be it for me to be presumptuous." She says with a lilt to her voice and a tilt to her head, you could practically hear the wink.
She really does think she's funny.
Much to Wuk's shame, she laughs at the joke.
As they pass by the guards at the door, they squint a little as they see the Hero of Tural leading their Vow of Resolve around like a lost child in her own house with each carrying a pillow. Hopefully these two aren't gossipy.
"This is the point where you'll need to lead me the rest of the way." Naoto lets her hand go and the warmth that is lost with the act is unpleasant.
Turning to look expectantly back to the Intrepid, Wuk can only blink confusedly at her until she helps explain herself by shaking the pillow she still holds in her hand.
Oh, yeah right.
So she now takes the lead, walking ahead of her lover as she feels her heart beating faster. First it increases when they get to the wing of the palace. Faster still when they enter the hallway. Even faster than that when she opens the door to her bedroom. She's only just now realizing that she will be the first person to enter her room besides servants and family and the significance of that hits her hard.
Naoto for the most part takes the mess in stride. Certainly not as clean as she keeps her own space, but there's a charm in seeing a room as it was lived in, not how it was presented. She looks over her various weights, takes a moment to look out the window to see the view, looks to the door in the back leading to a bath before making her way over to the massive plush bed before laying a hand down on the plush mattress.
"Huh, for some reason I thought you'd have a much firmer one than this, it's so soft it feels like I'd sink right in if I laid down on it."
Images of Naoto's naked body covered in the expensive lace and silk of her bed came to Wuk's mind unbidden and very hard to shake away as she watched her lay the pillow with the rest of them up at the head of the bed before she takes a seat at the edge of it.
There was a stirring feeling that had Wuk's tail lashing this way and that as she wondered just what form this goodbye was meant to be, and could feel her excitement mounting. Still, best not to seem too eager in case this was going to be more chaste than she expected.
Walking over to the bed and tossing her own pillow alongside the first, Wuk responds. "Zoraal Ja used to say the same, back when we were kids. He thought with how much of a hoyden I was it made no sense that I didn't just sleep on a hay bale or something." Setting herself down a respectable distance from Naoto, hoping not to get her hopes up too high for some fun, she continues to explain. "I just never saw the point of not having something soft to snuggle up on if I could have it."
"Hm." Was all Naoto said before something in the corner of the room caught her attention. Standing up and walking away, Lamat'yi felt a tinge of sadness watching her make any effort to move away from her, that possessiveness rearing its head again.
Though, what caught her attention anyways? Wuk Lamat never spent too much time in her room, there was a whole city's worth of more interesting things than whatever she kept in her room, maybe she was interested in her axe's weapon rack? Though why she'd be interested in that was beyond her, so she stood up and moved closer to her to try and see what she was seeing. Getting just close enough to her hhetsarro, like a crack of a whip she turns around and shoves her.
Wuk Lamat finds herself becoming overly familiar with the feeling of weightlessness as she once again is thrown through the air by the smaller woman, landing on the plush bed with a pomf. It was less than a second before a weight settles itself on her again as the hhetsarro finds a seat on her chest as she gives her captive under her a chaste kiss on the lips.
There's that levin feeling coursing through her once more, even from the brief contact before the connection is broken. The floating feeling she had lasted just until Naoto presses her forehead to Wuk's own, an action she only just now realizes calms her just as much as her scent does.
So this is what she meant by a more personal goodbye.
"I'm going to miss you so much." Lamat feels no desire to hide this truth from someone who so quickly became this important to her.
"I'm going to miss you too." Naoto responds with as much sincerity as she could muster, and if the xbr'aal heard right, a little twinge of sadness with it.
They stayed like that, eyes closed and foreheads together, breathing in sync with each other for what felt like an eternity and a second both, as they filled themselves with the scent of each other before Naoto spoke again.
"I do have to leave though." She whispered so quietly, as if she herself didn't want to hear it, to admit that there had to be a point where she joined her fellow saviors of the star and work on whatever task required her. She sat there, still and unmoving for another moment that stretched too far and short before she huffs. Laboriously lifting herself away, they look to each other, eyes half lidded as Naoto blinks slowly to her properly snuggled companion.
She won't leave if she doesn't get sent. Wuk Lamat realizes now. If she didn't give her permission, would she stay? Maybe for a night or two? Could it be as easy as that? It'd be easy to ask her to stay, and it's exactly what she wants.
"You should go. Who knows what fires need putting out." Wuk responds, nearly as quiet. A whisper that spoke of duty and how they both had their own to return to, her tone a mask of humor she didn't feel.
Naoto closes her eyes and smiles ever so slightly, as if she's proud her protege just passed a test she didn't know she was taking. She'd seen that face several times already and a warmth bloomed in her chest knowing she's made her happy, even if neither were cheerful from the result. This was the right thing to do, but neither of them really wanted it. Not truly.
The Gunbreaker leans back down to give another kiss, one the Intrepid is more than happy to reciprocate, though even that still ends too soon as they break away again.
Lamat's eyes still closed, she feels the weight of her companion leave her as she stands back up and walks a short distance away. She doesn't want to open her eyes, to see her leave. Maybe she could just pretend she's somewhere in the palace, and all it would take was walking down the right hallway at the right time to see her again.
"I promise it won't be too long before we see each other again, Lamat'yi."
"I'll hold you to that, Naot'yi."
Then she hears a sound she truly hates, the sound of someone teleporting. Going far far away from where she wanted her to be. Wuk bolts upright, eyes opening just in time to see a single tear fall from Naoto's eye as she smiles to her friend, her lover, her dearest, as the two are separated.
For now.
Wuk Lamat sits there in silence on her bed, feeling alone for the first time in a long while.
She falls back onto her bed, grabs a pillow, brings it to her face, and breathes.