#userstarmora

She’s never put much thought into what an afterlife might be like, simply because there’s been no place for that kind of an idea. As a child, in the Red Room, she’d had no exposure to the concept; to belong nowhere, one must also believe in nothing, and so the words of gods and prophets were never held above the requirements of the mission. As an emerging person, still testing her capabilities to make her own choices and develop her own beliefs, she’d focused on the living to combat her own ghosts. But having that knowledge probably wouldn’t have helped her, because something tells her that this isn’t it.

For one, she thinks, an afterlife probably wouldn’t feel like the worst migraine she’s ever had, with intensity turned up to a thousand. Just a hunch.

It’s hard to grab onto anything solid in the water she’s found herself in, but eventually, she manages to find a rock that doesn’t immediately slip from her fingers, uses the grip to lift her body to a sitting position. When she manages to stay in that without falling over, only scrunching her eyes shut a couple of more times, she gingerly stands; her feet aren’t as steady as she’d like for them to be, but she’ll manage. She’s pushed through the snow on a broken leg, two days after running out of her last rations. She’ll manage.

One foot moves in front of the other, sloshing water with every step. It all isn’t very inconspicuous, and would probably be the kind of thing that would make her an easy target for an ambush in any number of situations, but a quick scan of her surroundings tells her that she’s alone. Which is only a small comfort, because she doesn’t have a functional weapon; the gun she’d come to this planet with is long since gone, and thanks to impact and water damage, the gauntlets on her wrists are useless.

She’s alone, that is, until she isn’t.

A vague figure comes into her line of sight, and she freezes where she stands. The effort she’s already expended just to walk probably less than a hundred steps has already made her breaths labored and her legs weak. She knows doesn’t have the strength for a fight right now; the thought sits uneasily in her chest, and rises up to grab her by the throat. Fingers shaking, she instinctively reaches for the gun she no longer has, then lets her hand drop uselessly to her side.

She doesn’t know what to expect, but even if she’d had some guesses, the outline of a shield wouldn’t have cracked the top ten.

For the second time in five minutes, the world stops.

“Steve?”

It leaves her mouth before she can stop it, but –

She’s hallucinating. That’s the only explanation.

Except – the last time she checked, hallucinations don’t stop and turn in response to aimless voices calling into the distance. They don’t look straight at her, don’t sag their shoulders as they drop everything they’re holding into the water. They don’t run to her, wrapping their arms around her without hesitation and pulling her close the second they reach her.

They don’t feel like the only warm thing that could possibly exist on this whole goddamn planet, don’t make that warmth spread through from head to toe, shielding her from the wind and snow and everything else.

No, this is real. Somehow, it’s real.

“Nat,” he breathes more than says into her shoulder, and that’s the only confirmation she needs.

She feels tears on the skin of her neck, and when she eventually pulls away to look at him, there are more in his eyes, threatening to fall. A lump forms in her throat; it’s all she can do to keep her own contained. She lifts a hand, wiping the pad of her thumb over his face, and he catches her mid-motion, threads their fingers together.

At any other time, in any other situation, she’d have a dry comment, an easy joke, and that would dictate the beginning of their back and forth that’s become comfortable to her over the years, but right now, she has nothing. Every attempt gets lodged in her throat with the lump that she can’t manage to swallow down, and her tears betray her, falling onto her cheeks.

Loose strands of hair that had escaped her braid blow in the wind, and another chill runs through her, reminding her of exactly where they are. It’s all suddenly too much with his eyes boring into her like that, so she drops hers and reaches with her free hand to wipe at her face.

But he takes that hand in his, too, and she glances up again to find him smiling. “What do you say?” he asks her a moment later, fingers squeezing hers. “Wanna go get that life?”