of the light that burns within my soul.

MARGOT IS ALWAYS CAREFUL WITH HER PRIZED POSSESSIONS, BUT SHE TRUSTS HARA. That's all there is to it. She trusts Hara, and Hara got too close. (Margot doesn't know she needs to be more careful with where she hides Nate's key.)

To another killer, Hara would need to be dead. She's an unjustifiably high risk. But Margot knows what she's done; she knows what Hara thinks she's done herself - by virtue of existing as Hara. This isn't black and white; this isn't something that can be handled in the heat of the moment.

"Hara-"

My fingers, in your mouth - it would only happen if you asked. I would never do that to you.

Even the gunshot - Margot would never do Hara the indecency.

❛ ... I don't know? ❜

She knows what Margot said ⸺ the franic moving things into place, a messy tuck under the rug, quick and without proper discussion or aftercare ⸺ what she remembers what was said. He probably wasn't good for her. He wasn't good for her.

She twists in the couch corner. Her palm provides a place for her cheek as she naturally falls into herself. Margot's never seemed so serious and forlorn ... it solidifies an instinct that survival and entrusting Margot is one in the same ⸺ because at times she can be naive, a needy vessel willing to pour herself into anyone that shows her an ounce of care she lost out on growing up ... internally and deeply she must know Margot won't dispatch her for this (like most killers in her position would do).

She's almost too locked into the graze of his knuckle to catch his warning. Her right hand palms her left tit, effectively holding up her bikini top before it falls off. Her fingers flex in to white-knuckle an attempt of her own. The nacre-shine underneath the ruffle of her bathing suit bottom.

She turns, her hip rubbing into at least one of his lingering hands, and thinks at the same time ... the full picture of what exactly? would what be alright? Her body is not normally shy but for special occasions it makes an expectation. It's a tell-all book before a sexual instrument ... so it blushes accordingly.

She nods, ❛ Yes. It's alright. ❜

Parts of her wishes she didn't turn around. Told him to try again so she wouldn't have to look him in the eyes right now. See him on his knees, in this historical exonerated-needed pose. ⸺ find out for sure that he isn't just objectively pretty but personally pretty, too. and whatever animal he is (woof), she trusts it ⸺ And what would he need to repent for? That maybe he doesn't want to tie her bathing suit on.

AS INEVITABLE AS MARGOT BELIEVES THIS WAS, IT STILL HURTS TO HEAR.

Maybe she's being unfair or unreasonably hypocritical. Why would Hara's subconscious go there? Doesn't she know Margot loves her wholly and unconditionally and would do anything to keep her safe? Just look at what she's already done!

Exactly. Look at what she's already done.

Sitting in her unfairness and hypocrisy, Margot wonders if Hara brings this up now to hurt Margot.

Mentally, she takes a step back. Physically, presently, she takes the popcorn bowl from her lap and sets it on Hara's coffee table.

"How?"

❛ With your hands. Your fingers in my mouth. It almost felt intimate. ❜

Until it didn't.

The erotic connection between fear and sex is an abutting thin layer. Like the epidermis and dermis. Most people experience this arousal with things like roller-coasters or scary movies ... Hara veers closer yet. As if trying to make sense of moderate levels of scared. Or metabolize it into something worthy to stomach.

again feel free to switch around sender and receiver in these after pasting!

1)  sender takes receiver’s hands because receiver is cold,  rubbing and blowing warmth into them. 

2)  sender washes receiver’s hair while they take a shower together. 

3)  sender brings receiver a potted plant rather than a bouquet so it will last longer. 

4)  sender brings receiver a bouquet of flowers (feel free to specify what kind) 

5)  our muses are walking somewhere together and sender casually takes receiver’s hand,  bringing it up to kiss the back before simply holding it the rest of the way. 

6)  receiver is getting dressed and,  unprompted,  sender helps them zip up, attach a necklace, tie a tie, etc. 

7)  sender shows up at receiver’s door with homemade food to comfort them or because they aren’t feeling well. 

8)  sender remembered something receiver mentioned they liked and brings it or something related to it as a gift.

9)  sender randomly gives something to receiver that reminded sender of them (feel free to specify)

10)  our muses are talking and sender wordlessly reaches over to fix receiver’s hair without breaking concentration.  

11)  receiver has had a hard day and comes home to sender drawing up a bath and preparing their favorite comforting beverage. 

12)  receiver has had some task they needed to get done around their home and they find sender doing it for them unprompted. 

13)  sender wordlessly picks something out of the fabric of receiver’s clothing and then smooths it over while they’re having a conversation. 

14)  sender soothingly runs their fingers through receiver’s hair while they talk or are in a group setting. 

15)  sender brushes receiver’s hair out and fixes it for them. 

16)  sender places their hand on receiver’s thigh while they’re talking or in a group setting.  

17)  sender offers their arm for receiver to take while they walk. 

18)  sender slips their arm through receiver’s while they walk.  

19)  sender places their coat around receiver after realizing they’re cold. 

Even planets he heard of only during his classes when much younger, places he never thought he'd go to. Turns out, they were needed far beyond the mid rim and outer rim. No time to catch a break, really. At some point, he had gotten used to it. Never being able to have some free time for too long, having to call the space ship his home instead of the Jedi Temple he ended up growing in.

He didn't even remember the last time he put a foot in a place where he wasn't needed for warfare. Well ... That is until today.

He had receive a communication, or more like an invitation, to visit an old friend. Not recently, of course, but he was finally able to make it, and he could only hope that Hara wouldn't mind young Skywalker's habitual lateness. Not that it was entirely his fault.

Stepping down from his aircraft, astromech in toe, he began his walk on the path he used to be quite familiar with once upon a time ... Blue gaze taking in the sights. Not much had changed, even after this long. Rare were the times he was able to see such nice paysage as of late, not broken in any ways by the continuous battles. It was a nice change.

As he finally joined the meeting area, it was her voice he heard first ... Before his gaze laid upon angelic traits he would often see in his dreams, whenever he managed to get some rest. Even after all this time ...

❛ I said I'd come back, didn't I ? ❜

A little smile, then a slight bow.

By framing patience into a virtue, you strip it of its redeemability and/or skill. It becomes an endurance, an apparatus to suffer in silence for any ideologue to use. It's not bad ... necessarily but it doesn't necessarily make you good either ⸺ the having or having-not of "patience". Because patience is not a virtue. It's a coping mechanism. One she does not have.

This is one way he slights her.

⸺ would he think her less good for not having patience?

❛ Patience and morality ... I never understood the connection. ❜

She cuts ceremony. Behaves as if she were still alone. Her artful posing stays casual. Sighing into her role of host instead of angling herself the Princess-host she ought to be ⸺ they are friends? (still?) afterall. Four fingers fan a gesture to sit with her. It flaps once, twice like a wing of a bird before fluttering down to pluck her cup. A generous sip to swallow down the astringency. The tea she's made needs no added sugar, it's already naturally sweet.

Culturally, it would be a big insult if she felt serenity in his absence. If she could meet him without bitterness of loss of time. Her people miss people like people would miss limbs. Anything else is uncaring.

She looks back at him once more. Her eyes carefully drag him over to see if he's missing anything. He appears to have no major seen injuries of war. But she knows some of the biggest woes are internal. Like whether she can acknowledge the rebuttal, it certainly shudders ... no, most of her didn't think he'd come back.

❛ Come. Sit. ❜

Steam drifts in pale veils across Ren’s exposed face, catches in the raven lengths fallen loose around his shoulders.

“An oath to your father is nothing sacred. It is a burden—a death sentence.”

Unexceptionable and yet unremarkable. Like death itself. Although he had not always believed that.

“I know this to be true because it is something you believe. Something you’ve seen.” A tendon flickers beneath the pale membrane of his jaw. “Because I am infected with you.”

All he had ever done was escortHara from one chamber to another and guard the door. A sentinel, a hound. His black-gloved hand opens and closes at his side as though a hilt still burned there.

The baths cast fractured gold across the scar that darkened his right cheek.

The water lapping at her calf-parts. And finds affection in the idea that she could have opened his eyes ... and knowing all the ache that comes with that. This half of her softens.

❛ I did not think you saw ... ❜

Her voice yanks back several notches as if someone plucked it from her throat. As if recognizing, that she had plucked something from him. Even if she had not meant to.