Dinner was...I couldn't even tell what it was. I recognized some of it as being steak, very rarely cooked, but it was piled narrow and tall on my plate, sitting in a puddle of brown sauce and leaned up against all kinds of other green, orange, and brown things which I assumed to be edible because most of them carried grill or sear marks of some kind.

I thought I recognized one bunch as asparagus heads, but then again, thought I recognized another as a bit of pine tree, so I really had no idea. I watched Karu for clues, but she just seemed defeated and alternated between looking down sullenly at her plate, and snapping her head up before her father yelled at her about posture again.

Which was weird, because I'd never noticed Karu to have bad posture. Lia was always lounging around in the strangest of ways, upside down on the couch, sprawled on the ground. AEGIS just looked constantly like she was leaning into whatever she was focused on, and Saga, well, she laid there.

But Karu always seemed to me to be perfectly normal. Upright, forthright, and downright regal in her bearing. But something about her father seemed almost oppressive to her, and I guess it manifested like this.

I tried not to stare at her and instead watched a waiter walking a couple tables over with an armful of silverware. Suddenly, he tripped over nothing at all and the silver went bouncing and flying out of his arms. One rolled backwards from him, bouncing, and impossibly came to an abrupt stop on-end. A moment later, it fell over.

I tried not to stare at him either, as some asshole applauded while he scrambled to pick up the pieces and what was left of his dignity. Thankfully the other staff pitched in, and everything was back to usual in a moment.

Senator Idris was giving an amusing anecdote as he cut small pieces off of his plate, of a man who had woken up on the wrong yacht, miles away from shore. It was a good story, with a funny punchline, but I didn't exactly relate.

With Karu down, and the conversation I'd had with Idris, all I could think about was Mage.

"What kinds of things do you do for fun, boy?" Idris asked when we'd both finished laughing at his story.

"Oh. I don't really know anymore." Fun seemed like such an alien concept when we buried a friend today. "I used to play football and hang out with my friends and stuff, normal teenager things I suppose. But...I haven't had that kind of luxury in a while."

"Well, you have some now, hmm? Say, I bet you could teach me a thing or two if we went out hunting together. At the very least, we could shoot some skeet?"

I felt something tread on my feet relatively gently, but damn, was she wearing knives on her heels?

"I uh, I didn't actually shoot anything. Never fired a gun in my life, sir, honestly."

"Oh, I see, a bit of the Exhuman magic then? Well, as it turns out, I am a partial owner of the club, so I'm sure I could set aside some private space for that."

"I don't really enjoy using my powers, Senator. It's not as fun as you might think."

"Well, maybe just some golf then?"

"I don't know how to play."

"It's very simple. You swing at the ball, and then you follow it around all day. Very relaxing. It would probably help take your mind off of things a bit, and though I may not look it, I assure you I'm a fantastic listener. We might even teach you how to take a stroke or two off your game," he laughed.

I didn't laugh. I was going to, but someone basically jammed a harpoon into the top of my foot. I should have worn my combat boots instead of these shiny service ones. I didn't know I'd be in a damn warzone.

"Uh," I parsed the sentence and found the flaw. "We?"

"Oh, just me and a couple of friends. They're good people, they'd love to meet you. I didn't know what I was expecting when I asked to meet you, but you've certainly impressed me. Such a sharp diligent boy at such a young age."

I moved my foot and heard Karu's heel clack into the ground where it had been. Yeah, I know. Flattery. I get it.

"Sir, are you attempting to flatter me to get me to go hang out with you and your friends away from Karu?"

He blinked at me a couple times. Karu suddenly had to cough into her napkin in a way that sounded a lot like a stifled laugh.

He burst out laughing. "Sharp, as I said. I see now there's no pulling the wool over your eyes. Perhaps we should stop here for today, it was insensitive of me to make you come out here after a funeral."

"Yes, it was," said Karu, with some of her fire back. I wondered if she drained the vitality directly from my foot.

He shot her a glare and she withered again before turning back to me. "Son, I have no intention of exploiting you or blackmailing you or whatever delusions my daughter put in your head. I think of you as one of the up-and-coming, it's only natural for people to be interested in your rise, and darn if I am not one of them. I suppose you could call me your first fan."

He sounded so earnest, but now that I was looking for it, I could almost smell the flattery.

"Sir, with all respect, Karu was a fan long before you. As were all of my friends. If I've had any meteoric rise it is only because they have stood by me and supported me every step of it. Please do not dismiss them simply because they contributed to my successes instead of the other way around."

He snorted. "Fair enough. Keep me in mind though, boy. Washington is a small place and it doesn't hurt to have a friend who knows everyone. I understand if you'd rather sit in the trenches than bump elbows with a bunch of old dinosaurs like myself, but someday you might need something, and having those contacts is more valuable than not."

He reached into his breast pocket and handed me his card. Karu intercepted it and tore it up.

"I am certain if he needs your information, I would be able to give it to him," she said.

"I am certain if he needs my information, he's a grown adult man who can handle having it." He passed me another card, circumventing Karu this time, who just watched in disgust. "In case she decides to destroy that one, I'll also leave my number with your manager. My personal number. You're worth it, son."

"Uh, thanks." I said.

The rest of the meal was much less tense as we bounced around conversations with seemingly no agenda anymore. I hoped he'd said his piece and we could move on with the delicious food, now that I actually tried it. If Saga were close to this building and all of its inhabitants, I think she'd be able to die happy. Well, as much as she died anyway.

I'd hoped I could hear some embarrassing personal stories about Karu's childhood, but it sounded like she was much more open about those things than he was anyway. He did little but compliment her generically and tell well-rehearsed stories.

Finally I survived dessert and after one final bit of pressing me to accompany him on his yacht (cut short by Karu), we stood to depart.

"Ashton, hopefully you don't mind if I have a few moments to speak with my dear girl. We haven't had an opportunity in months."

"I cannot possibly imagine why," she said with a glare that could punch through a tank.

"I understand," I said. "I'll head back to the barracks then. See you later, Karu?"

"No," said Karu, her glare accompanied by a smirk now. "I believe I offered earlier that we were headed to my hotel tonight?"

I saw a visible shiver go through her father. It was, perhaps the first spontaneous, unplanned thing he'd done this evening.

I forced myself to laugh. "Oh, Karu. You kidder. Welp, see you tomorrow!"

"Wait outside if you please, Ashton, this will not take long!" she called at my retreating back.

As I sat outside, my butt slowly losing feeling on the white marble curb, and soft flakes of white only beginning to fall around me, I remembered Karu didn't speak spontaneously either. She was a shrewd thinker and was groomed to be a politician, by Idris himself, no less. As much as she'd been claiming to look out for my interests and use that as an excuse to shut her old man down, in truth, she probably was using me against him as much as he was trying to use me against the rest of the world, or whatever nefarious schemes he had.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

It was a pretty crappy and sobering thought, feeling like the last guy at the party to realize he was the butt of the jokes.

The light snowfall turned into a mild flurry and then into a silent constant heavy downfall. Curtains of snow were falling so thick, but so gently I could barely see across the street anymore, yet could hear nothing. The wind didn't stir, and it seemed like I was the only one in the world. I checked my holo. It had been an hour.

Finally, I heard crunching nearby and into the little circle of white around me entered Karu, holding her heels, her dress tied up at the waist, and her long bare legs disappearing into the ankle-high snow.

"My apologies to keep you waiting," she said. Her voice sounded conversational and light, but her face looked anything but. "Shall we walk?"

"It's dumping snow, and you'll freeze. Let's just call a cab. Doesn't your dad have a driver?"

"A little cold is the least of what I deserve for tonight," she said. "I must apologize again, and I assure you I will do so many more times before the night runs out." She sighed heavily.

"I could carry you," I said.

"You are strong but not that strong," she said, smiling at me. "Come. Let us walk. Are you cold?"

I shook my head, happy to just be off of the one dry spot on the entire curb and moving. I couldn't believe she was just walking barefoot through the snow. Her feet and legs were all red and splotchy.

And cold. Bitterly cold. Cold that seeped into the flesh and bone, that froze everything in its path. I felt my hand trembling and realized I couldn't move it. Realized I wasn't brushing frost off of my hand, that it was chunks of my own flesh I was tearing away.

"--ton? Hello?"

Karu's voice came to me from very far away and I looked up and realized she was standing right next to me. My heart was pounding in my chest so hard I thought it might burst, and my breathing was ragged and cold.

"Ashton, focus. Can you hear me? What is the matter?"

"Nothing," I said, shaking my head and putting my hand down. I clenched it into a fist. It shook a little, but that was just the loss of motor control from the nerves. They had told me that. "Nothing."

"Okay." This time she didn't start without me. We walked side-by-side in the middle of the street, the world seeming dead around us.

"Ashton, I must speak with you."

"About what your father said?"

"Yes." She swallowed. "Yes."

"Is he taking you back?"

"Despite the difficulties of the evening...yes. But--"

"Well, that's great, then! He seemed a little difficult, but not a bad guy."

Karu made a noncommittal noise. I was confused, I thought she'd be happier.

"...it's great?" I repeated.

"It...it is. It makes sense."

"Doesn't it make you happy?"

"Ashton," she stopped and turned to me, and I mirrored her. "How can you be so impossibly thick?"

"Uh. I don't know? Practice?"

She wasn't joking. She looked at me even more seriously than when she'd yelled at me over Mage's body earlier today.

"What did I miss, I am sorry," I said.

"I love you," she said.

"Oh." I felt myself go hot.

She spoke before I could say more, "And I think you are a fantastic paragon of a man, as I have professed many times before. It would not be an exaggeration to say that I have utterly fallen for you, despite your many failings."

"You're--"

She put a finger on my lips.

"And...I wanted you to know that. None of this stems from you or any failing of yours, though I suspect you will blame yourself regardless."

What?

"I have only loved once before, Ashton, I do not know if you remember. And when he...passed, it was the most gruesome anguish of my life. And that was merely a crush...though I did not realize it until recently what true reciprocal love can be. Ashton, you complete me in ways I did not know possible, but...for that reason...you frighten me."

Wait, what?

"I...when I am around you, I am the best myself I could possibly be, but I am also the worst. Often, when we part, I find myself reliving our conversations, and I am embarrassed by the things I said or did. You make me feel and say stupid things, and most of the time that is fine, even liberating. But sometimes, we cannot afford stupidity, not in your and my line of work."

She continued. "But worse, when I think of you in danger, my heart stops, my mind stops, and I can do nothing but fly to your side. I am aware you blame yourself for Mage's death, but I blame myself as well. I endangered the entire operation, and you would not raise a single word against me, and then, I acted with rash belligerence instead of calculating our best stratagem, and we lost a good woman as a result."

"Karu, you--" she shoved the finger further into my face. She was freezing cold.

"I love you, and know you to love me. I had silly romantic notions of the two of us fighting and dying together as one, but the fact is, I do not love what we are together. If I continue to act with immaturity and selfishness, I will get one of the both of us killed, and if it is you...I...I…"

She blinked rapidly and tilted her head backwards, snow falling on her face. It did nothing, and tears began to stream from the corners of her eyes.

"I am not strong enough, Athan. I can not...I can not lose you. Not like that." She shook her head and made a pitiful noise as tears and snow flew off of her.

"Karu, I don't understand," I said.

"My father...he told me he would allow me to rejoin the family, but only if I parted with you. I had intended to laugh in his face, but...I have doubts, Athan. I am scared, scared of us, and for us. Do you think me mistaken? Can you tell me...tell me that you will protect me, no matter what? That we will fight and die together and not apart?"

I looked at her, feeling my eyes drink in every detail of her being. Her brilliant green eyes, eyelashes flecked with snow. Her wild hair, at ends with everything else about her. The elegant white dress, tied in an inelegant knot at her hip. Snow pooled on her feet and piled on her shoulders, her skin burned pink, but she didn't even seem to notice.

I loved this woman. I loved everything about her, from her belligerent violence to the way she awoke slowly in the mornings but always found a smile when she found me in her bed. I loved that she was two women, a smart talker and a ruthless fighter. I loved that she put the world into good and evil, but still saw the grey in everyone. I wanted to spend the rest of my life with her, if I could, and cherish every day of it.

To keep her, all I had to do was to say yes. She teetered on the edge of emotional abyss, and now came asking for me to give her the push she needed. Either away, or into my arms.

"No," I said. "I can't protect you. I couldn't protect Lia or Mage. I can't protect anyone." Her face broke like a shattered mirror. "Trouble comes to me because I'm an Exhuman, and then I rely on the strength of everyone around me to save me. I try, every time, I try as hard as I can, and it's never good enough. I'm...it's like Tem said, I just make life harder for everyone around me. And you're right, Karu...if you stay with me...you'll probably wind up hurt or worse."

I was laughing. I didn't understand why.

"And your family is important, you know? You only get one of those. Guys like me are a dime a dozen but you only get one dad."

"That is the absolute last reason I am considering this at all," she said, shaking her head.

"I want to tell you that I'll be strong and protect you, that no matter what happens, nothing will come between us," I laughed. "But I can't. Isn't that funny? I have all this power, and it's all good for nothing. Even the one I love more than anything, I can't even hold onto her."

"But...I am that...that one?"

"I...think so. We haven't been together that long. Like...a week now?"

"Yes. I suppose...it would be rash to...to make such proclamations with such little data."

"I guess." I stopped laughing and just felt emptiness inside me. Data, she called it.

"And this is what I hate about you, Ashton. About us. Because even knowing that it is rash, knowing that it is illogical, I will say it anyway. You are my the one, I am certain. My heart tells me nothing else."

"Even though...you're breaking up with me."

"Yes."

"Did you know, when we first met, and you were trying to kill me, and then slowly became friends, I used to think you were just a crazy bitch?"

"I am not surprised to learn this, no."

"You really still are," I said, and laughed an empty, pathetic laugh as tears carved hot lines through the cold on my face. "Aren't you worried this is a mistake?"

"Of course I am. My brain screams at me, and it says, you fear losing him, so you throw him away? And when it has me nearly convinced, I remember Siad, holding his destroyed body, and how it would feel to hold yours, and know that I cannot. I have the strength to do this...but not that. Never that. I swore my life to God and to uphold good and right, but after that…" she paused and looked into the gently falling snow. "...after that...there would be nothing left of me but darkness."

We stood there for minutes, lost in a circle of white with nobody else in the world but us two. I'd never felt so alone.

"We should go," I said. "You will freeze out here."

She didn't argue. Like some kind of fey creature, she stepped through the snow in her elegant dress, flitting in and out of my vision through the curtains of snow. Her in white and me in black, together, but never further apart.

In what seemed like no time at all, the doors to her hotel opened and golden light stabbed at us from the real world we'd stolen away from for seemingly so long. People muttered and walked by, elevators and mobiles beeped, the clerk spoke on the phone.

"Would you prefer to come in and dry off?" she asked.

"No. I don't think...I'd be able to leave again," I said with a dry laugh.

"Get home safely, Ashton. I mean that."

"Yeah, I know," I said, privately wondering why anyone would care if I didn't.

She grabbed my face and drew me into a long passionate kiss, filled with her desperation and all of the unsatisfied yearnings we would carry forever.

"I did not exaggerate," she said breathily when she finally let me go. "You are my everything. I hesitate to use this against you, but I will this once. If you do not arrive safely home tonight, then I will not outlive the day either."

"Jesus Christ, Karu."

"I know no other way to ensure you do nothing foolish. Live. Grow strong. Someday...perhaps...when we are stronger…"

"I love you, Karu."

"I love you too, Athan."

I turned and went back out into the blackness. Alone.