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TITLE: Phygria
AUTHOR: Imraith-Nimphias
RATING: PG-13.
SUMMARY: Niobe remembers, though others may not.
CATEGORY: Drama/Angst.
AUTHOR’S NOTES: Thanks to Redqueen for betaing and for the title suggestion.
Phygria
The dock was not fully repaired. There were still large amounts of debris littered about, and the occasional squiddie. All the bodies had been carefully gathered up and honoured. That’s what they were doing in the temple now. It was the first gathering since the end of the war, and they were celebrating both the lives of the soldiers and the peace.
Niobe knew she should have been up at the temple with the rest of them, but instead she walked down here, in the dark and the silence, her only company the half-finished dock and the distant drumbeats of the celebration.
Perhaps the most disconcerting thing about the place was the silence. She had never guessed that the mere absence of noise could hit harder than a punch, pierce more surely than a bullet. Where there should have been the hum of recharging ships and the banter of working crews, there was only a leaden silence that weighed on her mind. The Mjolnir stood lonely and alone, emphasizing the empty space instead of filling it.
So many ships. So many crews. So many people.
That was the problem with the rest of the city it seemed. They remembered the deeds of the people who fought for them while they hid and cowered from the invading army. But nothing more. They were simply names on a list and bodies in graves. Not people. Not pet peeves or tempers or humour or laughter or personality. Just names. She would rather be forgotten entirely than remembered only as a name and a rank.
As much as she would have liked to say she knew most of the fleet on a first-name basis, she didn’t. And wouldn’t. Looking at the list of names she didn’t even recognize a quarter of them. It dropped like a stone in her gut and refused to leave.
A hand on her shoulder startled her out of her reverie. Instinctively, she jumped around and was halfway to breaking her visitor’s wrist before she registered what was going on. A soldier’s instincts.
“Morpheus. I didn’t expect to see you here. ”
“The same could be said for you.”
Niobe sighed. “Survivor’s guilt can be a bitch.”
The corner of Morpheus’s mouth twisted in a small smile that had neither humour or joy in it. “I know what you mean.”
Niobe turned to look at him, and saw what it must be like for him. He was one of two survivors of the most famous ship in the fleet, and had unwillingly and unwittingly sent Neo and Trinity to their deaths. If she thought she had nothing, this man had less than nothing.
She could sense where his thoughts were going. Where they usually went these days.
“They knew. You could see it, same as I could. They knew what they were doing and they did it anyway.”
Morpheus sighed, remembering. Remembering how she would only smile for him, and the time when he had made her laugh. How they were so reserved, so private, and how the little glances and touches that passed between them could be so easily missed, and their rare public displays of affection.
“They were so broken at the end. They had nothing left. Not eating, barely sleeping. I think I pushed them too hard. No apologizing now.”
“They did what they had to do.” Said Niobe, as much to herself as to Morpheus. It was a statement, a fact that brought no comfort to either of them, or to any of the fleet’s survivors. “I just wish…that I could see them again. Any of them.”
Morpheus smiled suddenly, an enigmatic sun peering suddenly from behind rain clouds.
“Maybe. Maybe some day.”
fin
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