Before I know it, twilight looms over Terrassa.

But I don’t mind. It’s a breath of fresh air walking with Paul like this. Just the two of us. In a way, I’m glad Friederika opted out of joining us. It would’ve been a little too awkward and I never was good with third wheels in a party like this.

Maybe that’s why I always ignored Paul in the past. Every day since I first met him in primary school. At Canberra, and so on.

I glance at Paul, darting back to the body of water to my right whenever his emerald eyes meet mine. It only happens a few times; deep down I eagerly hope it happens more. I wish he would act on it and embrace me. But it never happens. Just a nice little stride between estranged friends, a one-sided relationship that has smoldered to nothingness the past three or so years.

“It’s nice scenery, isn’t it?” I say. “this golden-bronze view.” Paul merely glances at me with a smile.

“Compared to you?” Paul says. “It’s nothing.” Neither of us says any further beyond that.

The railing stops, giving away to a gently sloped riverbank that descends and meets with the artificial body of water. Behind us, a wealth of blossom trees stand tall and proud over this quiet little riverbank.

“Care for a rest, love?” I ask, gesturing to a spot on the riverbank. “I’ve been walking all day and my feet are dying.”

Paul agrees, and we both sit down relatively close to the artificial riverbank. I find myself taken back by the cool, calming bronze-like surface of the river before us. Not a disturbance to be had. I feel more relaxed now than before. A part of me wishes I could simply retire here and forget about all the complicated Federation affairs.

But that is why I can’t retire just yet. I have to fight to keep this peaceful life for others.

Nothing on Terra could ever come close to this. But maybe it’s simply because I’ve been so far removed from society that I lost touch with what it means to live in peaceful bliss.

“This sort of takes me back a little,” Paul says.

“Does it now? Oh.”

“Figured you remembered all those silly days we had together then, eh?”

“Silly days, you say,” I say. “Yeah… it was something like that. Running after each other after school from the arcade, wanting to forget all the homework and just live as ourselves.”

“And yet here we are,” Paul says. Glancing out at the calm river and the opposite bank. “Vick…”

“What is it, darling?” I ask, shifting my legs around to support my elbow.

image [https://i.imgur.com/qj1EQXO.png]

Paul looks me square in the eyes—but I can’t bring myself to look away. It never occurs to me that I’m smiling naturally for once. Paul is silent for a few moments now, giving him the chance to have his say. I shove the intrusive thoughts away that I never gave him as much as a word in years ago.

“Sorry, hmm, ha-ha!” Paul forces out a chuckle. He leans back, Paul refraining with all his energy to frown. His gaze is on the artificial light as well as the Side closing its solar panels. It occurs to me that Yuri has likely departed for now with all this time spent. But it’s time well spent. If it’s with Paul and Friederika… I don’t mind the extra effort to return to the Yilan.

The Yilan, huh?

There’s likely not a chance I’ll ever even return the Yilan. I’ll never see Margot, or Lucas, or Friederika…

“You ever wonder what life would be like if we didn’t enlist in the Navy?” Paul asks after the lull in silence. It catches me off guard, a little I’d admit. But I hide it by grinning and brushing my hair.

“That’s all you wanted to say?” I ask. The uncertainty of whether I should tell him about the nightmare during the warp to Toscana weighs on my mind. Who knows what Paul may do with the revelation? Maybe it’s something I should take to the grave with me… and I never told Friederika about it, either. “I was expecting something more…” I trail off, looking into the calming water as my thoughts whisk me away.

Paul doesn’t know. Or does he? It strikes me that these two individuals I took as numbskulls for all my life would silently acknowledge what I have in mind for the upcoming operation.

“My life without the military?” I muse. “Far back as I remember, I wanted to follow my old man into space. I wanted to be in space with him because he was always up there when I was small.”

“I remember,” Paul says. “We had a career plan questionnaire in the third grade.”

“I’m embarrassed you would even remember that,” I say, trying to hide my cheeks with golden locks of hair. How far back did this numbskull fall for a carefree girl like me?!

Paul can’t contain his laughter. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you flushed like that before.”

“Oh, put a bloody cap on it you wanker,” I mumble to Paul’s amusement. Do I have any choice now? I lock eyes with Paul, with those charming emerald eyes of his. He smiles, trying his hardest to be avoidant about the sudden attention.

“What were you hoping I would do, military notwithstanding?” I ask.

“University, or something like that?” Paul muses. Leaning back onto the grassy riverbank, arms lazily resting behind his head. “Your other goal in life was being a historian or something like that, right?”

“I’m a little shocked and creeped out that you even know or remember that. Should I ask for a restraining order against you?”

“Friederika told me a few times,” Paul says, huffing the bangs of hair in his face. I reach out, snatching the thick glasses clean off his face. “Hey! What’s the big idea?!”

I twirl them in my hand, slowly, and gently. “It was never a real aspiration,” I say. “But maybe it’s what I was destined to do?” Paul doesn’t interject, so I continue. “Maybe it was my fate to be on the Yilan at that specific day on that specific time.”

“Vick…”

Stolen story; please report.

“Who knows if a more capable officer was capable of keeping the fleet alive? We could’ve killed the Scarface. We could’ve easily crushed their capital and encircled them at Rouen. Maybe fewer people would’ve died.”

I get up, dusting my bum as I do so. I turn to face the puzzled Paul. He quickly scrambles to his feet, not bothering to reach for his pair of glasses.

“Paul…” I mutter. “You know, you look handsome as a button without these thick-rimmed glasses.” The excitement I get from Paul being embarrassed swells my heart. But I have to pop it. For my sake, and his.

“Paul,” I say, gently closing and cupping the glasses. “Back then… during the jump to the Valspon system, I had a nightmare. Every night since then I dreamt of it. It involved you.”

“It was just a dream, wasn’t it?” Paul asks, reasonably baffled.

“Who’s to say?” I turn to face the lake. “It felt so real… I never lucid dreamed before, it would be an understatement to say it was surreal.”

“Well?”

“Stop cutting me off, you bloody bloke! I’m getting there.” I take a deep breath. “We were together on a beach, and you talked like we left the military life behind us and that we got together. I didn’t know what to make of it then, and I still don’t know.”

I turn to face the man.

“You…” I struggle to get the words out, clearing my throat. “You died, Paul. All your fabric and being literally melted before my very eyes. And before I knew it, I was in an inferno with your charred skeleton. Then the nightmare ended and Lucky Alphonse began.”

Paul takes a moment to take it all in. He slumps to his bum on the grassy bedside.

I kneel next to him, cupping his chin with one hand and slipping his glasses with the other. “Your hands are bloody cold,” Paul says.

“I was expecting you to say I’m a cold cunt.”

The two of us try to chuckle it off. I look into his eyes, wondering if I should tell him about the bizarre nightmare with Friederika—the one where I died and he presumably got together with her.

“Paul, I’m sorry.”

“Huh?”

“I never… I never gave you the time of day.” I return to my feet, glancing out at the increasingly bronze cityscape. “I gave you cold shoulders at every turn. And yet you continued to chase after a hopeless girl like me. Even to the depths of hell, following me into the fleet when there was no guarantee we’d even see each other ever again.”

“Victoria, what are you bloody on about?”

I turn to face him. I clench my fists, unable to just come out with it. With a deep breath, I head up the hill, Paul calls out to me, but I ignore him. The pain swells with every step.

But he clasps my hand. I stop in my tracks, turning to face him slowly. “We… we can talk about this, I’m not too sure what’s going on—Vick!”

“Paul,” I say, clearing my throat. I bite my lower lip, turning to face him fully. Cupping my other hand over his. “Did Friederika tell you what happened earlier? She must’ve told you what happened when the two of us went to the Trinidad.”

Paul’s eyes widen. That must’ve got him thinking. He shakes his head, perhaps in denial. He tries to form words that don’t come out. He copes and argues internally. He shakes his head, one last time, squeezing my hand in return. It shouldn’t take a genius to realize what I want to do.

“You’re a bloody maniac, Vick,” Paul says, grabbing me by the shoulders—it nearly startles me. “You damn well didn’t sign up for this.”

“I didn’t sign up to live and let others die while I sit back living comfortably,” I answer. Paul lowers his hands and I step forward, embracing him lightly.

“Paul… if I don’t come back, I want you to live happily ever after with Friederika.” I squeeze him tightly. “I don’t want the two of you to suffer and die alone. I mean that.”

“How can you say something like that now?” Paul says, trying to remain composed. “I want to be with you, not Friederika.”

“Do it for me, will you?” I say. Pulling back to brush tears out of his defeated eyes. “Live happily and have lots of kids for me.”

“You should save that for when you actually depart,” Paul says, trying to force a smile. “What will you do if they reject your transfer?” Then suddenly, he adds. “What will you do if you survive?”

“Then,” I try in vain to hide a blush, “I guess I’d just have to live with my consequence, won’t I?”

“Did… you ever tell Friederika directly?” Paul asks.

“Well, I won’t lie when I say I figured you two would’ve already concluded with your one shared brain cell by now.”

“I wish you would give me and Friederika some credit.”

“No can do,” I say wryly.

Without warning, I lean in, pressing his lips to mine. For a few moments of grace, Paul wraps his arms around me. I can feel his heart pounding in perfect rhythm with mine.

“Believe it or not, Friederika adores you a lot,” I say softly, pushing myself away. “If you tell her, I’ll kill you. And even if I die, I’ll haunt you to the ends of the galaxy.”

“That’s a threat if I ever heard one,” we laugh off the morbidity of the moment. “It’s getting dark, Vick… should we head back?”

“Not yet,” I answer. “I think… I want to stay here by your side for a little longer.”

“We’ll be keeping Friederika waiting, you know…”

I pause to think. He is right. Friederika getting stood up by her two closest friends is not something I want to think about. “No… it’s fine, I think she’ll come to understand. She let us have this much time to ourselves, after all.”

Paul clears his throat. He breathes in heavily and cuts loose a heavier sigh. The two of us sink side-by-side onto the sloped grassy riverbank—our knees touching. I rest my head on his shoulder. I slip my nearest hand onto his and casually lock fingers with him.

“This feels wrong, Vick,” Paul says, struggling to get the words out. “This isn’t… right.”

I don’t answer.

I don’t answer because he’s right. The girl of his dreams comes up to him and confesses she’s going to fight in a battle that she was never meant to be in the first place—and he’ll never see her ever again. It’s wrenching, but how else could I live with myself?

“I’m sorry I wronged you all these years,” I say quietly. “I never gave you attention, I never…” I struggle to find my voice. Paul reaches for my other shoulder and rubs it lightly.

“Just hearing your voice and face again is enough for me,” Paul says. “Maybe… deep down I never knew I had a chance with you.”

I clear the growing lump in my throat, leaning more onto his shoulder. A lonesome tear strolls down and falls on his jacket. He slips his hand free of my interlocked grip and holds my chin up.

“Even in those few moments when you did look at me, it made me happy,” Paul says. My cheeks burn red as Paul rubs them. “That I occupied at least a little of your mind from time to mind.”

“You’re speaking absolute nonsense,” I say, struggling to keep a smile. My heart cracks with each word.

“I have the most absurd gal in the galaxy in my arms, there couldn’t be anything more nonsensical than that,” he remarks. I merely refute with a precision jab at his side. Paul lets out a pained chuckle.

“I wish we could experience this moment forever,” Paul continues, quieter this time. “A moment cherished as a memory.” I hold him tighter. “Free of worry, and just run away from all our problems.”

I bite my lower lip. Could my dream be stemming from this, I wonder? I will never know for certain—neither of us will. Which one of my dreams is real—which one is false?

“Vick—you’re squeezing me to death.”

“Oh!” I exclaim, letting go and pushing myself away from Paul. The lad can’t help but chuckle. For someone who’s probably about to lose his angel, he sure is cheery.

Not that I could blame him in the slightest.

It’s dark now. I already miss the golden river and the charming grass. Now it’s just pitiful. Twilight has come to consume us at last. I wish I could simply reach out and push it away—if only to selfishly make this moment last longer.

Paul gets up before I do and extends a hand. I take it, perhaps begrudgingly. With one last view of the riverbank, Paul and I walk back from where we came. Neither of us says a word as we pass first the railing, then the strobes of antique lamps dotting the path ahead.

If only things could’ve turned out differently, I muse on the way back.