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maybelinefox · 20 days ago

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Amber & Blood

characters: traximus and nyxram rating: g content warnings: n/a word count: 3061 relevant tags: grief/mourning, post-canon, canon compliant

"Have... you ever done something like this?" When she sends him an inquisitive glance, he continues, "...mourned someone?" Her jaw tightens. He’s seeking companionship. He didn’t want to journey here alone, and he doesn’t want to be alone in grief, either.

---- With the rebellion's success, the New Republic making slow but steady progress toward a better future, Traximus decides it's time to make an important trip. Nyxram accompanies him.

[ read on ao3 ]

She'd always thought the Trebai Archipelago haunting from a distance.

Scattered pieces of what may have once been a small moon drifted just beyond a significantly larger silver planet, its orbit slow and almost lazy. Long, tangled tendrils of grayed plant root and organic matter kept the dozen 'islands' linked in a cluster. The archipelago's origins predated their history; no one quite had answers for how the system had remained 'one' for so long, and even less answers for how its flora continued to thrive even in vacuum. Spots of vibrant gold, red and teal leaves, flowering white plants--even a 'river' that flowed through and between the islands in twisting figure-eights, unbound to soil.

They’d chosen one of the outer islands to land the shuttle, so it’d be a walk to the piece at the center. Ranzar had fussed--insisted he could easily pilot them further in--but Traximus held firm this was the safer decision. Nyxram knows it’s more than that. She hardly minds. The two of them will make the trek while the crew minds the ship.

She casts a final nod over her shoulder to Grax, who salutes her from the shuttle's ramp, before she walks to Traximus's side. They make their way across the rock toward the first of the thick, winding roots that stretches to the next island across. The gravity should be weaker. Even for their large size, they should float, drift, need to watch their surroundings for stray debris. But the gravity here is strange, too. They walk as though they were on a homeworld vessel.

"You've been here before?" Traximus asks, suddenly, as they step onto the root. His voice is clear over her helmet's receiver; clear enough to catch a stiffness in his tone and exhaustion he’d long been trying to hide. It wasn't the focused, but warm, cadence she'd come to know.

"No," Nyxram answers. "But I've seen it."

Traximus grunts, shifting the satchel over his shoulder--the spear in his hand. "It's beautiful."

"Mn."

They continue across the root and step onto the next island.

Nyxram frowns to herself. He's trying to make idle conversation; distract himself. You're not giving him much to work with. "...why here?"

"What?"

"Why this place?" She clarifies. "What made you choose it?"

"Oh." He shrugs, clearing his throat. "He’d mention it when... when we'd discuss fond memories. --during meals. Suppose it's... as good a place as any. He never brought up family."

"But he had memories of the archipelago?"

"--yes. Traveling. Said he came here to think."

Nyxram's brows rose. "Traveling, then. What did he travel for?"

"...I don't know."

"No?"

"--no." There’s frustration in his voice. Then, something more akin to sorrow. "...No, I. I don't know, he... I guess I never asked." A pause. She saw his head turn to her from the corner of her eye. "Have... you ever done something like this?"

When she sends him an inquisitive glance, he continues, "...mourned someone?"

Her jaw tightens. He’s seeking companionship. He didn’t want to journey here alone, and he doesn’t want to be alone in grief, either.

Nyxram turns ahead, allowing her stride to widen. "Watch your step on the next line up,” she says, “these 'roots' are older than some galaxies. Best not to test them."

Behind her, Traximus sighs. They keep forward.

Somewhere above, a meteor flashes by. A wash of white and silver light blooms over the brownstone, sharpening their shadows and striping the ground in liquid patterns cast from the river. There’s no wind here. No sound. It's something ethereal, like walking through a dream. Their only clues of passing time came from subtle changes in the light or the water’s slow, steady flow.

Traximus doesn’t try to initiate conversation again. Neither does she.

They reach the center island. Roots emerge from various cracks in the stone, curling and tangling across its surface until they join to form the tendrils of material that hold the archipelago together. The water stream curves above and down, arcing the length of the island in a translucent halo that dapples it with flecks of light. Most of the archipelago’s plant-life resides here. She wonders if it houses a larger organism at its center. If all the flora binding the archipelago--blanketing its surface--are merely smaller extensions of one.

Nyxram slows her steps, allowing Traximus to move ahead. She follows him to the base of a mass of roots and flowering stems, just beneath the river’s center. Some of the plants stretch up toward it, as though reaching for a chance that stray droplets might land on their petals and leaves. For a moment they stand, silent.

Traximus steps to the mound. He kneels at its foot, setting the spear to his side and sliding the satchel from his shoulder. There's a painstaking care to his movements as he opens it, as though he feared he may cause a large disturbance by just unpacking. It was… odd. Watching him like this.

In their time together, building and operating the rebellion, she'd seen his usual forms of physical expression. Collected, but never afraid to be loud, assertive, or slam a fist to emphasize a point. He held the attention of a room as easily as he breathed, the trust and respect of those who listened even more so. A commander he was, in near every sense of the word. But here he knelt, moved, with great effort to make himself as small and unremarkable as possible. It felt like something she shouldn't be seeing. Nyxram folds her hands at the small of her back, and she turns her eyes elsewhere.

She watches the slow shift of debris beyond the silver planet’s gravitational reach. On the first island, she can see Zuron has wandered out of their shuttle. His smaller form stands beside Grax, and they seem to be talking. She allows herself to wonder what about.

Maybe the make of the archipelago--the driving force keeping the flora alive and the river on its path; that would interest Zuron. Or plans once they’d returned to homeworld; Grax had made passing remarks--mulling over meals he might make for Xi the next time they'd have dinner together. A long overdue night to themselves. She must be eager to have him for more than the time they spent asleep. The rebellion may have succeeded, but the demands of a new beginning were unending, the work never done. Traximus had barely managed to carve out what time he wanted, needed, for this.

“We didn’t have much.” Traximus’s voice comes through her receiver (the silence, perhaps, has become overwhelming). His tone is cautious, measured, and almost… timid? She didn’t quite have the word to describe it. “After… the arena was cleared out, I tried to search our old cells. His cell. ...I don’t know why; I guess I thought… I thought he may have stored something. --left… something I could find and bring here. But there wasn’t much about that life you’d want to hold onto. Nothing… worth the risk of hiding away.”

“Nothing material,” Nyxram said.

Traximus exhales. “...no.” A small pause. “No. …--but. He preferred the spear. It will do.”

Nyxram frowns, and she turns her head to him.

Traximus stood, the spear now in hand, facing the mound. The hand clenching the spear held it well. A trained, even grip. He’d wrapped a vibrant red cloth around the head of the spear just below where metal and wood connected, secured with a thick golden-threaded rope. Hanging from the center tassel was a single ‘drop’ of amber. Even in the limited light, it shone brilliantly.

“Why the spear?” Nyxram asked.

“Distance,” Traximus answered, “resourcefulness, or a make-shift shield. Sometimes a walking aid if something went wrong. …he preferred to out-last than he did to fight.”

Her brow wrinkled. “How is it that he found himself there, then?”

Traximus remains still, not looking at her. There’s anger in his low tone, searing the words when he speaks, “...sometimes, you just need fodder.”

She remains still and quiet as his open hand curls shut. Watches as it shivers by his side, claws biting through the gloves of his suit, and as his shoulders rise with on held breath. He steadies himself and steps forward.

Traximus places the blunt end of the spear against a fracture in the rock. He takes care to wedge it into place without disturbing surrounding roots, the cloth--without jostling the amber drop. Despite his efforts, his movements are stiff. His hands grip the spear tighter than they need to, and he growls--irritated--when the spear's end slips from its place. But he pauses, seems to steady himself a second time, and tries again. It's a delicate line between too gentle and too rough, and he's struggling to find the balance. Again, the blunt end slips. And again he stills before giving it another try.

The spear takes to the rock this time. Once certain it would stand on its own, he steps back and releases one hand. She waits, patient, but he doesn't release the other.

"Do," he breathes, suddenly (and there’s brittleness in his voice; like the slightest misstep in word choice will break it), "do you... know what it's like? Looking up. And realizing the room is... is cheering because you... because someone you..."

"...Traximus--"

"--do you?"

Sharper. But the veil of anger is gone. There's only pain.

"...no." It's a half-truth. Her room had been two. Not a stadium of hundreds. "I don't."

There's a long pause. She hears him exhale, slow and ragged through the receiver. His fingers adjust around the spear's staff. "You... were there that day. Weren't you?"

She's quiet.

"Up there," he continues, "with him."

She remembers.

"...was it a good show?"

She doesn't answer. She doesn't know how.

Traximus swallows, a strained sound that their comms shouldn't pick up. "He should have won that day."

Something inside her hardens to steel. Whether he's speaking of Tilus or Zanramon, she can't tell. It worries her.

A silence stretches on. Then, only once his hand pries from the spear and drifts back to his side, does he speak again.

“Is it… daft of me to think we owe so much to him? To the turtles, even--to… --that I would never have…”

Nyxram frowns. “You feel their aid lessens what you’ve accomplished?”

“I let myself become a husk of everything I stood for," he said. "I didn't manage to find my way alone. Not like you.”

“You think I found my way alone?” She's surprised when her voice reveals how much his statement offends her. “Traximus. Just as you didn't emerge from your darkness until you met the turtles, I did not emerge from mine until I saw you throw your sword at Michelangelo's feet. --Should I be ashamed of this?”

Traximus pauses. He sighs, a heavy rush of air against the receiver. “I suppose not.”

He lifts the satchel back over his shoulder and adjusts the strap. Nyxram watches as he turns and starts back the way they came. There’s a new weight in his steps. A wilt in his posture that hadn’t been there before. An impulse strikes her--drives her to do--what? …something.

He's just passed her when she turns the word over on her tongue. It’s almost bitter.

“No.”

“Hm?” Traximus stops, turns his head.

Nyxram flexes her fingers. “The answer to your earlier question: …no. I’ve never mourned anyone.” Then, slowly. “...I was never made to think of it that way. …as ‘mourning’. So, I didn’t.”

He blinks, thrown off, and faces her in full. “How were you made to think?”

“A victory. I got to live.”

“...So did I.”

The words are unaccusatory and soft, not meant to be cruel. But they still sting. Nyxram looks away.

“Do you want to?” He asks.

She turns back, almost startled. Traximus opens one arm toward the mound. There’s a carefulness in his expression; a gentleness that bleeds through harsh lines brought by exhaustion and stress. It makes something deep within her ache.

“...it’s,” she hesitates, “…it’s been dozens of cycles, Traximus. Hundreds.”

“You’re suggesting this sort of thing has a time limit?”

“--no,” she says, perhaps quicker than she’d meant. She felt. …she felt disarmed, suddenly. It wasn’t a feeling she liked. “I mean to say I’ve had my chance.”

“...A time limit,” he repeats.

She growls, turning away again. Traximus huffed. For a moment, she thought the topic dropped. Then he asks again, “...do you want to?”

Nyxram tightens her jaw. She looks to him.

Her hand moves on its own, lifting to the knife strapped between her collar and shoulder. A flick of her thumb, and it comes loose from its sheath and slides like liquid into her palm. She pulls it free in a sweep of her arm (a gesture that would surely cause anyone who recognized her name to hold their breath; Traximus remains at ease). She steps forward to stand before the spear and mound.

The knife rotates in her palm. It catches the light, a glint that had been the last so many had seen. But it’s not the fine edges nor expertly crafted metals that hold her attention. It’s a detail no one would think or know to look for.

Her hands had been shaking that morning. The knife was something she’d grow into, and she hadn’t held it right--not like she’d been trained. Her misplaced fingers left room for blood to fall where it shouldn’t--where her future skin would catch it instead. A small section of handle had been exposed. There was one single, thin, strip of blood that she’d been careful to never wash away after all this time.

It wasn’t amber. Quite the opposite, actually.

Where amber could hold once-living things, a once-living thing had held this.

Again, Nyxram rotates the knife. It takes her a moment, but she finds a place between the roots and rock that will cause the least amount of damage. The knife slides into the coils until she feels them thicken, slowing the blade to a stop. Carefully, she lets it go and steps back.

Traximus moves to stand by her side.

“...what was their name?” When Traximus asks, his tone is just as soft as it had been before.

Nyxram shakes her head. “He never received one.” A pause. “Names are for things able to last, and he wasn't. --their. Words, not… not mine.”

She’s not sure why she felt the need to emphasize that.

Traximus hums. “It seems he has.”

Nyxram glances at him before she can think not to.

“Lasted, I mean,” he clarifies. He clears his throat. “You remember him. You… want to mourn him. That's lasting, isn't it?”

She looks back to the knife.

“...could you give him a name?” Again, the question is careful. He’s unsure if he’s treading where he shouldn’t. “You don’t have to.”

Nyxram can only breathe. It feels as though something in her chest is becoming undone. There’s an old emotion, one she’s never had a name for, clawing its way through her every fiber and bringing with it a sense of vulnerability that should be unforgivable. In standing here, in giving up the knife, in admitting she has someone to mourn at all, she is left bare and exposed. She's confused. Panicked?, even. What so many would give to capture her in even the smallest moment of weakness. But Traximus doesn’t strike.

“Thank you,” he says instead, “for coming out here today. Listening to me, even though... even... when I...”

He trails off, rounds to her other side and returns to the spear. “I’ll… --you know how our schedules are. When there's an opportunity to revisit, I will. You’re welcome to join, but there's no need. It's your decision.”

She watches as he reaches out, smoothing down the cloth’s folds, straightening the amber with a tender pinch of his fingers. He rests his palm on the spear’s head, and he goes still. She waits, half-expecting him to say something else, but he doesn't. He turns with a sigh and starts for the shuttle. Nyxram remains where she stands.

She waits until he’s reached the nearest coil of roots before turning her head to the spear. Her hand lifts as she takes a cautious step forward, and a finger taps the button on her helmet that disables her microphone. She refolds her hands at the small of her back.

She remembers that day. Zanramon summoned her back to the arena (remembers thinking it troublesome, annoying, a waste of her time--what twisted views of those soon to die). She remembers seeing the platform lift the two of them to the surface; Traximus, still large and imposing despite limited nutrition, and how much smaller Tilus had appeared by his side, his head only just reaching Traximus's collar. They'd all thought the only opponents that day would be a pack of starved leapers. She should have known by the creeping smirk on Zanramon's lips that they were wrong.

Was it a good show?

No. And made worse in that it was necessary for her. That only in seeing the knife fall--watching Traximus's face grow ghastly, hearing Zanramon laugh--did her eyes finally open and a cold awareness seep into her marrow. It hadn't just been wrong, it'd been monstrous. Abhorrent. She'd retreated to her quarters that night, shaken, disturbed, and ashamed. For cycles, Traximus had voiced his disagreements and concerns with Zanramon's direction, choices, priorities--only to be brushed aside and belittled, and finally enslaved. It shouldn't have taken that to realize that they'd long crossed a line. To realize, for certain, she wanted nothing to do with the old regime.

“...thank you, Tilus.” The softness in her voice surprises her. “You saw him first. Believed in him before the rest of us thought to listen. That was our mistake... one you should not have paid for.”

She extends a hand but stops just short of the spear’s metal. Her fingers close. She lowers her hand to her side and sighs. “...Rest now.”

“Nyxram?” Traximus’s voice comes through her receiver.

She taps the button for her microphone. “Yes, I’m coming.”

She walks to the roots, eyes focused ahead, and falls into step behind him.

He slows until she walks at his side.

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