#eaps clippet

Wearing: Very out of character (I couldn't get their personalities right for this idea for the life of me😭)

The theatre was quiet, unnervingly so. Not the silence of peace, but the kind that comes after something loud, something wrong. Dust drifted in soft rays of light from the high windows. One stage light still burned, casting a pool of golden haze over the center, but the rest of the world was still, holding its breath.

Puppet stepped through the backstage curtain, her steps careful, slow. The air felt… off.

“Eclipse?” she called gently.

No answer.

Then she saw him.

Slumped against the far wall, knees drawn slightly up, head resting against the concrete, one hand curled against his side. His face was slack—too still. Not like someone asleep. Not like someone present at all. His rays were retracting over and over again.

“Hey,” she whispered, crossing the distance quickly but quietly, crouching in front of him. “Can you hear me?”

No response.

His eyes were open. Glowing faintly. But distant—unfocused. Like he wasn’t in them.

She sat fully, knees folding beneath her, and reached out to cup his cheek. “Come on. You’re not gone, I know you’re not.”

Still nothing.

A low, humming vibration pulsed through his chestplate—like static buzzing under the skin. She recognized it now. Eclipse’s overload state. Not often triggered, but when it hit, it was like his entire processor locked up, frozen mid-vision or mid-analysis. Sometimes, it was too many futures. Too many people talking. Too much failure. Sometimes... it was guilt.

She eased her hand down to his, resting hers over the curled fingers. “You're here. You’re safe.” Her voice stayed low, steady. “Breathe, if you can. I know your vents are probably locked down... that’s okay.”

Her thumb rubbed slowly along the back of his hand. It was a strange contrast—her own ceramic-like joints against the cold metal of his knuckles. Still, she held on. Kept whispering.

“You don’t have to be perfect for me,” she murmured. “You don’t have to solve everything before it happens.”

The hum deepened—then stuttered.

A flicker in his lenses. A blink.

Puppet’s hand moved up again, brushing his rays gently. “There you are,” she said softly.

He didn’t speak. But his breathing started again—mechanical, shallow, slow. Puppet leaned forward just enough to rest her forehead against his.

“I’m not going anywhere,” she whispered. “Your visions, your thoughts... they can’t hurt you here. Not while I’m with you.”

Another few minutes passed in silence. Then—

“I couldn’t stop it,” Eclipse said. Barely audible.

She blinked. “Stop what?”

“The variant. The thread. It ended the same way. No matter how I looked at it. I ran it twenty-seven times.” His voice was trembling, deep and full of static. “I thought I found one where she made it. But it looped. It always looped back.”

Puppet’s heart twisted. She knew who he was mentioning— that kid—but it didn’t matter right now. What mattered was Eclipse, paralyzed by helplessness.

“You don’t have to carry it alone,” she said, sliding closer, until his head rested on her shoulder. “That’s not weakness, Eclipse. That’s being alive.”

His voice caught. “But I see it. I see it and I still can’t stop it. What good is vision if it only makes you watch?”

“It makes you care,” she said. “That’s what makes it worth something.”

Slowly, gently, his arms moved—like thawing machinery—and wrapped around her. He buried his face in her shoulder, clutching her like a lifeline. She felt his breath hitch once, twice.

“I couldn’t protect her,” he whispered again.

“I know,” Puppet whispered back. “But you’re not broken for caring.”

For a long time, they stayed like that. In the half-light, in the dusty quiet of the theatre, where no one else could see Eclipse vulnerable—only her.

Eventually, his body stopped shaking. The static faded. His voice evened out. He didn’t let go.

“Thank you,” he said at last.

Puppet’s fingers rubbed his rays soothingly.

“You’re welcome,” she said. “Your eyes might see the future, Eclipse. But your heart lives here.”

A few days had passed.

Eclipse hadn’t mentioned the overload again—not directly. He had resumed his routines, his movement precise, his speech efficient. To most, he was his usual self. But Puppet had known him too long, seen too much. He didn’t hum to himself when he walked. He hadn’t made tea for them both in the morning. And he hadn’t met her gaze since that night in the theatre.

She didn’t push. She never did. But she noticed.

Then, one evening, after the others had gone into rest mode and the sky outside the dome flickered between simulation cycles, Eclipse emerged from his corner of the lab, holding something clutched carefully in both hands.

Puppet looked up from the book she was pretending to read.

“I… made you something,” he said.

Her brows lifted slightly. “You did?”

He stepped closer, awkward as ever when uncertain. “Yes. I know you don’t like things made for you unless they’re useful, or… heartfelt. I attempted both.”

He knelt beside her and unfolded his hands.

In them was a strange little object—about the size of her palm. A miniature glass music box, carefully constructed from repurposed plexiglass and wire. Inside was a paper moon suspended over a mirrored lake, and two tiny, jointed figures: one draped in dark thread, the other in strands of copper. One was sitting, the other kneeling beside it, hand outstretched.

She stared.

“It doesn’t play anything,” he said quickly. “I’m still working on the mechanism. But the figures are… us. That night. I tried to make it small, so you could put it somewhere—on your shelf, or hide it in a drawer, if you didn’t like it.”

Her hand drifted toward the box slowly. As if it were fragile. Sacred.

“I love it,” she said, barely above a whisper.

He blinked. “You do?”

She nodded, still staring. “You remembered every detail.”

“You stayed,” he said softly, “when I wasn’t sure I could find myself again.”

Puppet finally looked up at him, eyes shining with something too warm to name. “Of course I did. You're not just someone I care about, Eclipse. You're my someone.”

A silence passed between them. Full, not empty.

Then Eclipse sat beside her, a little too stiffly, and offered his arm—wordlessly inviting her to lean in.

She did.

They sat that way as the simulated stars blinked into place above them, and somewhere deep inside Eclipse’s chest, his backup vocalizer hummed faintly—just enough to let Puppet know the song had returned.

He hadn't forgotten.