#altrel

"Yes, Minister, what is it?" "My Lord ---- Look..."

" armitage, "   her palm splays out over the bedsheets. long, clawed fingers curl, twisting the soft fabric between them. kneading, she hums softly. a sole eye casts its gaze to the man with whom she shares her final room. his face is unfamiliar.  " when i am gone, which i imagine to be rather soon, "   carefully, she plucks at a thread. for a moment, it is her world. she remembers the man in the room. his name. his face. her boy, bore of a another's womb, but hers in the end. she turns her palm over, an offering.  " .. i want you to take my place. you are the only one that can fill it. "

He swallows dryly.       Above the infinite whispers of the stars beyond and the discordant voices of the specters that rise to haunt him –beyond the graves of victories won and grueling trials that stripped him to the bone, exists one truth,     ‘ You are loved, Armitage ’   

He knows now that he will never know a love like this again, for the continuum of eternity.  And in this moment, he is uncertain if he can bear it. 

 ❛ Mother, ❜ he murmurs as the veil is torn, revealing a bramble of dread and despair beneath a tremor of stormy jade. The silt of subdued tears paint constellations across ginger lashes. Craters form in the bedding as the mattress sinks beneath the press of wiry elbows. ( He has grown older, wiser, taller and weathered with bitterness. But the waifish figure remains. Along with the tenderest curves of a smile that surfaces explicitly in @altrel's presence. )  All barriers lay shattered. Emotion bared. He slides his hand into hers tenderly. Long freckled fingers curl around a clawed digits with easy grace. Armitage’s fiery head bows as he places a lingering kiss upon the back of her small hand. His eyes lift to lay upon her, dark ringed and raw from tears. He nods slowly as the words pierce the stone-wrought walls of his reserve with relative ease. ❛ I shall. I will not allow everything you built to be lost. ❜ His voice tremors slightly. ❛ Your efforts will not have been in vain… ❜ he coos to her tenderly as if uttering a lullaby to a child. ❛ When our Empire stretches across the far ends of the galaxy, it is your name that will be remembered.     This I promise you. ❜

Storms break.    Tides change.    Life catches you in its current.          When the lights fade and the murmurs of “I love you” dissolve into the dark spaces in the room, he feels eerily alone. 

His hands are stained a violent red—seeping into the lines of his palms as if weaving a web of fate yet unknown. Smoke rises around them, stinging his eyes, clouding his lungs. His breath comes as a raspy wheeze. Blood stained fingers caress his mother’s weary face, as the young Captain kneels beside her, his senses keen despite the gentle attention he pays the fallen Minister. ❛ Shh, you are going to be okay. ❜ he murmurs to her assuredly before shifting swiftly to aim a shot between the eyes of an oncomer. Teeth flashing as a rush of feral instinct overrides his senses. The body falls as the smog begins to clear.