#wails...

Operation Archon had been laid. However, mobilizing forces takes time - and in the minute interim, A'steri Arkus found herself wandering the halls of the Waking Sands. It was... to call it 'surreal' aught lend credence to a sense of wonder, or something akin to whimsy. But the surrealism A'steri felt as she walked the sandstone halls was not of whimsy, nor wonder.

But grief.

Of walking the halls of the dead, a tomb disturbed and restless. Where she turned and saw volunteers and Scions alike rebuilding, reacclimating... all she could see were the piles of bodies she had stumbled into mere weeks ago. Where there were bustles of activity, her ears pricked only to heavy, oppressive silence.

T'was only when she found herself wandering back into the Solar that she was brought back to the present; Minfillia, in her ever-present powers of observation, noted the thousand-yalm stare carried in eyes once so full of hope. A frown touched the Scion keeper's lips, as she rounded her desk and placed a gentle hand upon her charge's arm.

"...pray tell me what ails you, A'steri," Minfillia spoke with an air close to caution. A'steri blinked, ears twitching towards her voice, and found that she was unable to muster the smile she was so used to carrying. "Please... I well know that what you have done for us was not without its trials. Talk with me, A'steri... are you well...?"

"...Minfillia..." A'steri whispered. "I know all of what transpired here that day. When I arrived to bring news of my slaying of Titan, I... what I found... it will haunt me for the rest of my days. I received an Echo, of... of Noraxia's dying wish... and every day, I think... I think of how meaningless her death was."

"Meaningless-?!" Minfillia started - but A'steri was quicker, holding up a hand as her ears lowered.

"I ought to have been there, Minfillia." She cut her off, her tail tensing, fur standing on-end. "The Imperials - they were there for me, were they not? They took you in my stead. They slaughtered our friends - our family - like animals! Every night- every night when I close my eyes, I see their faces, I see them piled dead upon the floor with their blood seeping into the stone, and - and I hear within my own ears, over and over, that if I were there, they might yet still live. Your torture, Noraxia's death, Thancred - all of it may as well have been by my own hand-!!"

"Enough!" Minfillia cried, clasping A'steri's wrists tightly within her hands. "I'll hear no more of this drivel - A'steri, had you been here when the Empire arrived, you well know what would have taken place. They would have but one extra prisoner, and countless more dead. You alone would not have stalled their assault... their massacre of our fellows."

Her grip softened, as did her expression. Minfillia crouched some, just enough so that she was fully eye-level with the mourning miqo'te, and clasped a hand at the side of her head to draw her forehead against her own.

"You are not the Empire. You held not the weapon that slaughtered the ones we love," Minfillia declared. "Martyrdom will not return our lost to us... but only then will their loss be truly meaningless."

She moved to embrace A'steri, drawing her in to rest her head upon her breast. She could feel A'steri tremble.

"Steri, my dearest one... you are not to blame. You never were."

Then, and only then, for the first time since that fateful twilight in the church battered by desert sands, did tears fall from A'steri's eye. And in legion did they fall.

Minfillia held her there, for many uncounted minutes. Only when A'steri moved away did she release. Minfillia's fingertips moved to A'steri's chin, a touch as gentle as down, and a smile just as such.

"We cannot bring back those we have lost," Minfillia murmured. "But we can fight for them. We have our plan of action. We need you, Steri - the Scions, here and gone, need you. All of Eorzea needs you."

She cupped A'steri's cheeks with both hands, a gentle, encouraging touch -

"Thancred needs you."

A'steri swallowed, tensed. She didn't have time to wallow, to drown herself in self-blame and cries of would-have-been. Eorzea would be in flames if they did not act. And the one she held closest in her heart was in grave danger, alone and unbidden.

Eorzea needed her.

Thancred needed her.

"...what did I ever do without you, Minfillia...?" A'steri sniffled, removing her glasses briefly to dry her own tears - an act Minfillia beat her to, delicate fingertips tracing across her cheek to clear the offending tracks. And she smiled, that same gentle smile that could calm a raging tempest.

"You infiltrated an impenetrable fortress, for one matter. Pray tell me that is not an accomplishment worthy of praise?" she pointed out with a sly grin, drawing a laugh out of A'steri -

how’s my portrayal?

9 times out of 10 you’ll find that the other person is just as scared as you are of doing it and so with both of you scared it never happens. it can be hard to start a conversation but often it can be worth it no matter how brief the reunion.