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Hearing Joshua’s name still makes him start, a little flurry of sorrow running up in him.

“I do need him,” he admits. As, he’s realizing, he needs her. He searches her face, wishing she would turn it to him. “But I need you too.”

He hesitates, head throbbing. Her hand clasped under his. He couldn’t trade them. Not for any reason.

“He could not save me. He tried, but it wasn’t enough. It killed him.”

She does look at him, pained, when he mentions Joshua's death.

"Ultima killed him," she clarifies quietly, but firmly. Regardless of what exactly happened, details Clive will not share, Ultima is the one responsible. Everything is because of Ultima.

“Yes,” he says. “But Ultima did not strike him down, rather he burst forth from the Crystal in Joshua‘s chest.”

He swallows, dry and thick.

“He had locked Ultima away there to protect me… and it killed him.”

The inevitable result of the decision to try and contain him there in the first place. The mental image is enough to have Jill make a strained noise before she can stop herself, the sound from an effort not to burst into tears.

She pulls her hand away to clamp it over her mouth, fighting to keep the emotions down.

She'd argue it's still entirely Ultima's doing, but she needs a moment to keep her composure.

Tension be damned, sense be damned — he reaches for her, a large hand settling on her elbow, like he could guide her to his arms with the gesture alone.

“He spoke to me the whole time,” he says, a tremble surfacing on his voice. “Of the Hideaway, and our mission, and you. But he knew his body couldn’t survive. He gave me Phoenix.”

She could have resisted until one critical part: and you. For as much as she hoped for a life with Clive when they finished their work, she has hoped to continue to rebuild her relationship with Joshua, make up for all the years lost.

She can't squeeze her eyes tight enough to stop a tear from rolling down her cheek. Oh, but the blood--her last excuse to avoid falling into Clive, but her bloodied fingers have already gotten it on her cheek.

"You never said," is all she says, voice cracking, before allowing herself to press her face into the top of his hair, only a little mindful of his injury.

And now she knows. He has all of the Eikons.

The sting of her weight against his cracked head is nothing compared to the relief of holding her, the grief of the mere thought of Joshua. He slips his arms around her, cautious, loose.

“I know,” he says, apologetic, a hand tangling in her hair, his own tears catching on his eyelashes. “He believed in your hopes for me, that I’d save myself… but he died in my arms… how could I risk your life, too, my love? How could I let you pin your hopes on someone who only brings ruin?”

The only reason she can tuck him under her chin is because he's seated. So she does, reaching her arms around his shoulders, hold more firm than his owbmn. No matter what happens between them, they both love Joshua. They both grieve him.

"Isn't that what we fought so hard for, all this time? The freedom to choose. Joshua chose his path, and so did I."

And then Clive chose for them.

How divine, to be held by her, after the last month. He's feared it and taken it for granted, but here, he can sink into it, pressing his face against her throat.

"And I swept everyone's freedom away by failing to defeat Ultima," he says, with a breath that veers towards a sob. "Death is all that's left."

"It's not your fault, Clive. None would ever blame you but yourself," she tells him. She can feel the blood, now sticky, against her neck from where she'd failed to wipe it away from his wound, but she doesn't want to pry him off her.

"Death had not been so bad, until recently." And it has hot water on demand. Like he said. But it's a poor consolation for all that was lost, she knows.

"And for that I can take the blame," he says, a hand roving up her back as he wraps both arms around her fully.

That, she can't argue. Jill takes a deep breath he'll feel, arms tight around his shoulders still.

"I'm sorry," she says, and she's not apologizing for her coldness or distance or anything she's said or done. "I'm sorry you hurt so much."

Maybe the least she can do as they learn to live apart is not add to it. She doesn't know. It's difficult when she's in pain, too.

For a moment, he just sobs — ugly, shoulder-shaking things that is hardly served by the blood loss and the exhaustion. But he has her, for at least this moment, to hang onto.

All that he’s at fault for, there is at least one thing he can do.

“Jill,” he says, soberly, tear streaked. He lifts his head away from her just to find her face, but he doesn’t get far. “Even if Valisthea is lost, I will build you a better life here, for all that you’ve done for me, and continue to do. I want to earn your faith in me again.”

She's never known anyone else to sound so terribly broken when they weep. It shatters her defenses, and she sucks back her own sob as she holds him to her, cheek on the top of his head.

When he tries to lift his face, she tucks him right back against her neck and chest. It's easier this way, when they can hold onto one another and not have to see the sorrow in their faces.

She wishes she had the trust she had in him from a month prior. He's talking nonsense, even now, so sad and pained from both his injury and his own emotions.

She just shushes him and holds him.

"You need rest," she says gently.

Words, he realizes, are fruitless; not only do they feel thick and difficult to put together, but they say nothing about his ability to follow through. Actions. He needs actions.

But right now he feels like he's got a battle axe being wedged deeper and deeper into his skull, inch by inch, moment by moment. There's a pressure behind his eyes that begins to feel intolerable, and he can't just blame the blow to the head.

"I'm exhausted," he admits, still holding her.

"Let's get you into bed and I'll finish cleaning you up there," she tells him, needing to get some space between them before she simply decides to never let him go.

Besides, his strength is surely waning and she can't move him without his help.

She very carefully peels herself away, skin sticking to him where the blood is drying. They're both a mess. Jill only wipes at her neck with the back of her hand, not wanting to look at his face just yet.

He just nods, letting her go and immediately wiping at his eyes with the heel of his hand, as though he still might get away with his tears not being noticed. And then, with the efficiency of rote practice, he starts unbuckling armour.

Jill gives him some privacy so she too can wipe her eyes, quietly sniffle, and gather the towels and bowl of water to take to the bedroom. The covers are already down, ready for him, so all that's left is to grab him a cup of water from the kitchen.

She takes a long drink from the glass before topping it off and putting it on the nightstand. She's so tired. If things were different, she'd be pulling him into bed to curl up against him and sleep until things were less terrible.

But things are not different. She can only do what their situation allows.

"Do you need help?" She asks as she slowly approaches him. Undressing, standing--any of it.

Clive has most of his gear off by time she's back, down to clothes and boots. His vest is unlaced, hanging open to reveal an Underarmour tank top with the front slashed to the navel. He's working at his boots slowly, his head spinning from leaning that far forward.

"Yes," he admits, a touch reluctantly. She's done so much.

"I'll take care of that," she says, a hand gently pushing back on his shoulder before she kneels before him.

He must feel awful if he's admitting he needs help undressing. She gets one boot off with an ease he could never manage in this state, and glances up at him as she works on the other.

She wants so desperately to hold him again, wrap her arms around his waist and bury her face into his chest. The longing feels all the worse after allowing herself to comfort him. She misses him and now... she sees that maybe he does need her, and he knows it, too.

But they still sat in this very apartment and he broke her trust and her heart without second thought. It still hurts too much to forget or forgive.

"Thank you," he says, sitting back again. It's really more of a slouch; he has no doubt he can get to his feet again, but his head is starting to spin.

He picks at the remaining lacing on his vest, and then the lacing on his trousers. He glances at her as he does, but seeing her kneeling at his feet puts a hard lump in his throat, so he averts his eyes to not make either of them uncomfortable.

"Do you remember when we were children, and Joshua was very small," he murmurs. "And when he was frightened, he'd crawl into bed with one of us?"

Jill looks back to his boot, carefully sliding it off his foot. She finds herself mourning lost time. They should have all grown up together. They should all be together now.

"I do," she says, standing and reaching out to help slide his vest off his shoulders. "Terrible as it was, I looked forward to seeing his little face peer at me in the dark."

He trusted her as much as he trusted Clive to protect him, keep him safe. So much for that.

He hums under his breath, sitting forward just enough to help her get it down his back, slipping an arm out with a brief wince. The undershirt can stay on, sweat-slicked as it is.

"He would just stare, wouldn't he? Unable to put whatever nightmare he'd had into words, hoping you'd understand if he met your eyes long enough."

Five years isn't too much of a gap in time, but Joshua had been sickly, and that had made the years between them feel much longer.

"By morning he'd have all your blankets and you'd have bruises on your legs from where he kicked in his sleep..." Clive reminisces, nostalgia in his eyes, sureness on his voice: "But he had slept."

She wonders if his nightmares were actually prophecies of what horrors there were to come. It's not a thought she'd voice to Clive even on a good day, so she focuses on carefully freeing him of that vest and letting it drop by his boots.

She seems to think the sweaty undershirt needs to go, and she slowly begins to peel it upwards.

"I'd wake up with his head on my pillow and my neck aching from whatever angle it was at in the night," she recalls, a quiet fondness in her voice. "But it was worth it, to see his smile in the morning. To know he was no longer afraid, and that I did that for him."

He sits up a little straighter, lifting his arms up to make it easier, watching her every moment that there isn't fabric passing over his head. He likes seeing her fond. She's prettiest when she's nostalgic. Happier.

"Mm. I'd take any scolding by his nursemaids or my mother to see that smile."

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wow she drinks from his glass... v. intimate... I see...

💋 practically a kiss when he drinks from it

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give me the other tag back this one is too sad

it lives on only in your memories now

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