#bianuca

& taglist. thank u for putting upwith me

@skylilac

@callas-pancake-tree

@sillyguy-supreme

@steal-nightmares-leave-dreams

@neverseen-nevermore

@abubble125

@purplesoup-lad-le

@gay-otlc

@thefoxysnake

@keeper-of-the-lost-dadwin

@ravs6709

@corruption-exe

@kamikothe1and0nly

@that-glasses-dog

@presidentroarie

@even-if-in-another-time

@nyxpixels

@slozhnos

@katniss-elizabeth-chase

@sofia-not-sophie

@moontoastt

@lemon-girl-in-devil-town

@three-bunnies-in-a-trenchcoat

@purpleunicycle

@just-a-honey-badger

@loverofallthingssmart

@antisocialdork

@tamsong

@cutebisexualmess

@tastetherainbow290

@gayupstraight

@myfairkatiecat

@famousinfamous

@oroshka

@tw-5

@squishmallow36

@iggydancebreak

@cosmxc-ars3hol3

@amandayetagain

@aurenflare

@kyeiscrying

@wait--where

@arsonistblue

@hydroflxwers

@an-ungraceful-swan

@bookwyrminspiration

@absolutely-existing

Maruca wants to hold her hand, but even if she could do that without causing her pain, she isn't sure what it would mean. Years before, there wouldn't have been any sort of hesitation, only relief, comfort, familiarity.

The thing is, she knows the feeling of her hand so well that seeing those fingers twitch in her sleep is a phantom pain, an absence so familiar that feeling it is easier than it would be to feel the real thing.

Biana's mouth purses and her face screws up on itself for a moment before fading back into worried sleep.

(god, that mouth.)

Livvy had taken her aside, an hour ago, when the bandages had just been wrapped and the color had still been gone from her skin. "Elwin will tell them that the scars might fade. He will give her a possibility, maybe a hope."

"And you?" Maruca asked.

Livvy looked at her. "Maybe in a hundred years, there will be nothing remaining from this day on her skin. But the scars will still be there."

Maruca scrubs at her face with her hands.

She can hear Fitz in the next room talking to his parents, swoops of anger filling the area before he remembers to keep his voice down. Della's sobs punctuate the conversation. Alden's voice is lower than usual, pieces of his crisp accent lost in raspy worry.

Sometimes, it's like it only took a day for their family to fall apart. But then Maruca remembers it really took two, even though she wasn't around for either of them.

One: Alden's mind break. Two: Alvar's betrayal.

She wonders if this day will be the third. She knows it would have been if Fitz and Dex had taken any longer, or if Livvy hadn't been in Atlantis, or if they hadn't found her in time.

Still, all she knows is that there was the last day she was there: when Della was smiling, when Alvar was making his stupid jokes, when Alden could tease his children without worrying about the consequences, when Fitz still had that laugh that didn't turn dark halfway through. When Biana's breaths were even and balanced and calm.

And then there was every day after. When she'd see them in public, or in meetings, or in school, and suddenly the memory of the planting scattered its leaves through every long-lasting look, or there was a missing piece from their unified front.

If they hadn't found her in time.

The thought is more than a prickle or a pang. It's an explosion, a road to a future without her. A future she never imagined, never wanted to imagine.

All the future she'd imagined consisted of kisses in the dark and smiles across a bright room and fingers tracing arms and thumbs scraping across cheekbones and dark hair twisted carelessly around a knuckle and limbs slung over stomachs—

Goodbye does not have to go both ways.

It doesn't even have to go one way. Biana never said goodbye, but neither did she. They never made a promise not to grow apart, but Maruca doesn't think it would have mattered.

In the end, it wasn't a clean break.

It was a drawn-out pull, like a strand of yarn from a threadbare sweater. It unraveled so quickly and so suddenly that all of a sudden Maruca was left with threads the size of hairs and no way to weave them back together. It took several months of wondering when it would happen and then all of a sudden she was gone.

Gone.

"I'm scared of losing you," Biana had told her once upon a time. Back before the first time falling apart. Not the Vackers, but them.

Well, great job, Bee. 'Cause now she's fucking terrified.

Biana stirs. 

Fitz is there immediately, thanks to his sixth sense that tells him whenever a sibling is either dying or betraying him. He leans over the bed, hand hovering an inch above her cheek, her hair, the closest he can be.

Maruca was scared for him, of him when she'd arrived. Eyes bloodshot, voice breaking every other word. He'd let go of her hand and then his nails had almost gone through his skin from clenching his fist too hard. He'd tried to smile at her and she caught a glimpse of a wild animal prowling, barely hidden anymore.

Dex had rested a hand on his shoulder, and it calmed and provoked him, sending him pacing and tearing his hands through his hair and eventually, sitting by her bed with his mouth moving, whispering to her what she'd never be able to hear. Dex sat beside him for hours, even if he's gone now, mixing elixirs for the scars that will never truly fade.

Maruca sits on her other side, staring at the bandages and thinking that maybe she should go into healing if only so she'd have some idea of how to be useful.

"Biana," Fitz whispers. Her eyes crack open.

Maruca almost retreats, but she's never hidden before and she refuses to now. She crosses her arms over her knees and twists her fingers together.

"Did we win?" Biana asks, her voice gravelly from sleep and screaming.

Fitz hesitates.

"They saved the city," Maruca says. Biana's eyes widen, flicker over. Then they drink her in like there's no one else she'd rather see and there it is. The reason she fell for her in the first place. That power, that makes her feel like no one else in the world matters, like no one else could make her complete. Maruca clears her throat and refuses to look away. "Linh did. And Sophie, Keefe. They saved Atlantis. Gisela tried to flood it, but they blocked up the barrier, held back the ocean."

Biana tries to sit up, mouth pressing into a fine line as she feels all the bandages over her neck, cheek, arm, and side. Fitz helps her, eyebrows pressed into a worried line. Still, relief eases the tension in his neck, the stiffness in his shoulders.

"So, did we win?" Biana repeats.

"Some will say yes. The Council will say yes." Maruca shrugs. She sees the gray in Biana's skin and can't imagine how it can fit together with victory. "I don't know."

"Sophie's parents," Fitz says. "They're safe. Everyone is safe."

Something eases in Biana's face. "Some losses. Important wins."

"You could say that," Maruca says. Biana looks at her again, and her eyes are tinted red from exhaustion and pain but still they carry with them the Vacker power. The one she's craved and hated for far too many years.

She's absorbed, as everyone ends up some way or another where Biana Vacker is concerned. It's not that she thinks of nothing else, but it is that along with all those other things she's still there, lingering just behind as an echo. Maruca considers a question on her Universe worksheet and finds the stars reflected in teal eyes.

This is the Vacker effect. The pull, the gravity of it enough to harness the moon into orbit. The power leaks from them like tea drips from a teabag once it's turned the boiling water dark. You can sense it when they walk into a room. Any of them, but especially her.

At least, this is what Maruca assumes everyone else sees.

For a moment, the feeling disappears and a weight takes its place in a band around Maruca's throat. The feeling is missing her, and it's not that it abates but that it's overwhelmed by hating her.

@stopstealingtomatoes @bylerlve @that-glasses-dog @constant-sapphic-breakdown @katniss-elizabeth-chase @abubble125 @callas-pancake-tree @appleflv @writingandwritten @theseasonalarsonist @isnt-it-delicate15  @oracle-cookies @malewifegradyruewen @keeper-of-the-lost-dadwin @nyxie-of-the-night @kale-of-the-forbidden-cities @honey-the-dinosaur-ate-our-kid