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[allgotrabies]

Hey, it's Annie, you know what to do.

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[loveisall]

He's quiet for a long moment, but he's thoughtful. Not ignoring her. Just giving himself space to think. "I know about the Death Toll. I thought there was a chance that we would be revived, but there was also a part of me that thought we wouldn't. That this death would be my true death. And I was afraid. Terrified, Annie. I didn't want it."

He brushes his thumb across her hand. "A far cry from where I was on the rooftop ten months ago."

[allgotrabies]

"I'm glad it is. Even though it's," a breath. What word even covers it. "Hell. It's different when it's someone else's choice...someone else breaking you. But I knew I wanted to live then, too. Maybe more clearly than I ever have."

[loveisall]

He pulls her close at that. "Your turn," he tells her softly. "Tell me what you're thinking."

[allgotrabies]

"I know it wasn't B." She needs that to be clear. She struggles to know it sometimes right now.

"But I haven't had a friend hurt me since I was human. And it was like everything I ever shed when I was turned just came back on me, and I remembered I'm as weak as I feel sometimes. That I can't do anything for you or for me when it gets bad. And it reminded me why-" she rests her head on his chest. "Reminded me why I didn't have friends anymore at home. Just pack."

[loveisall]

He brushes his fingers through her hair, just listening. "It's difficult to feel like a burden, unable to help," he says softly.

"But you aren't weak. Not really."

[allgotrabies]

Even with the death toll, even with the sense of loss and failure, she's soothed by his fingers in her hair. "I've let everyone I love be killed. And I guess I've realized all the training with Sariss, and talking to Callisto, isn't going to change that."

[loveisall]

"Change what? Change the past? No, Annie. No amount of training is going to change what's happened. And weakness isn't in training muscles and techniques," he explains.

[allgotrabies]

She tips her face up to look at him. "So how do I become strong like you?"

[loveisall]

"Sometimes I'm not strong. I'm strongest when - when I let people help me," he admits. "I'm weakest when I won't. Annie, I - I didn't tell you what I did to Quentin. In the woods."

He frowns.

[allgotrabies]

Listening closer now. "I didn't know you even saw him."

[loveisall]

"Briefly. I couldn't travel in the day but he wouldn't leave me. So when I saw him that evening, I told him that he would have to go on in the morning without me. Let me stay. He refused. So I helped him build a fire that night. Ensured he would be alright and then - " He shudders. "I left him there."

[allgotrabies]

She doesn't know Quentin well, but she can imagine what he must have felt. She can imagine Quentin trying to find Godric again; it's what she would have done.

"Why did you feel like you needed to go?"

[loveisall]

He's already talked to Quentin so he knows that he's not in trouble any longer. But it was a shit move and he knows it.

"Because he threatened to stay. He said he would risk hypothermia and a death toll for me. I didn't want him to."

[allgotrabies]

Her terror at being alone makes it hard to know what she would do. The part of her that wants to be stronger, to take a stand instead of cowering, wants to believe she'd do what Godric had done. It was the less wrong thing, in her eyes.

"That's an impossible decision, Godric. No matter what you did it would have been hard. Have you seen him since?"

[loveisall]

"We spoke. He was angry at first, but I think he forgives me. I apologized," he explains. "I think he was more worried than he lets on."

Which, naturally, makes him feel worse.

[allgotrabies]

"Did he make it out?" Alive, she means.

[loveisall]

"He says he did. He said he just got hurt on the road," he explains. "And he sounded energetic enough to be...very upset with me. So I assume he wasn't death tolling."

[allgotrabies]

"I'm sorry," she murmurs, holding him a little tighter. "It might take a little while but I think he'll forgive you." Godric is someone worth forgiving.

"Was he upset you left him alone, or upset you didn't let him die for you?"

[loveisall]

"Oh he is well past forgiving me. He even tried to apologize for calling me an asshole and a jackass. Which I told him I very much was." He sighs. "He was upset, I think, that I left him alone there. And was worried because I died."

[allgotrabies]

A soft, amused scoff. "I'm pretty mad we died, too. You probably would've been better off with him than me."

[loveisall]

"No," he tells her softly, pulling the blankets off of them and blinking at the light. "I would have been better with everyone. We all would. There was no way to win."

[allgotrabies]

"Okay. That's true. Except for the rage people." She squirms like the light is a physical thing on her, which is about how she always reacts to getting out of her blanket best.

"How many people died?"

[loveisall]

"Too many," he answers, apologizing for the blanket breach by stroking her hair. "Come on. Out of bed. At least walk with me to the couch."

[allgotrabies]

The same groan she always gives when she wakes up, but it's always playful. Even now. Equally playful is the light bite just under his ribs, before she gets up and throws on a long shirt.

"Let's watch something. I think it helps get us healthy faster."

[loveisall]

He smiles. "You didn't need to get dressed," he tells her. "I'm not." He crawls out of the bed and wraps himself in a blanket, heading out to the living room.