She’s sitting on the cold, dirty grating, staring down through the gaps between each little flat piece of steel, wondering what she’s still doing here. What she’s really still doing here. Nothing has changed, after all, and nothing will change. She can’t. He can’t. Neither of them will. And yet…And yet she’s still here, still waiting, still hoping – for what? For some miraculous event to bring them together? If Miranda and all they went through then couldn’t break them out of this self-sabotaging rut they’re both trapped in, it isn’t likely anything can.

She brings the cold, rough edged cup to her lips, the tin flavoring the young but strong alcohol within and she winces at the taste; revels in it at the same time.

For a minute she lets herself imagine, lets herself believe she could bridge the gap between them. Pretend it would all work out, that they could live happily ever after; let herself love him, let him love her, if only for a little while. Have that much at least. But every time she sees Zoe, sees the devastation, the shattered pieces held so tightly they’re on the verge of crumbling…

Sighing, she sets fire to the dream, charring the straining timbers that reach across to him, keeping the gap intact. Oh, if only she could burn them all away, tear the supports from their foundations and let the structure collapse and take with it all thought of ever reaching the other side.

It would be so much easier.

But the structure is too sound, the arches too strong to crumble. Always there; reaching for him, yearning to cross, yearning... Still, she turns away, for how, how can she doom him to Zoe’s fate?

Coward, she calls herself, and maybe she is, for not giving him the choice; for not telling him. She barely acknowledges the truth of it herself, and yet there it is, like a shadow, always standing just off to the side, but never far from view.

Closer than it used to stand.

For a moment the despair wells up in her so strongly that she fears she’s going to break right then and there, disintegrate beneath the emotions she’d long ago wrested into submission that she no longer has such control over. And for an instant her calm façade does crack, her mouth pulling down tightly, her eyes filling and her throat suddenly full of all the fear and hopelessness and a bitter rage that fate would treat her so cruelly.

Her hands grip the grating fiercely and she forces herself to focus on the biting metal, cold and unyielding; pushes back the grief that always seems to be just below the surface these days and straightens her spine, physically steeling herself against the tide.

She draws in a shaky breath and tips the last of the cup’s contents to her lips, resigned and no clearer on her course. She knows she should leave and spare him any further attachment – knows too if she doesn’t go soon, one of these days she will be weak and the truth will spill from her - but she’s not strong enough yet. The fewer days she has before she will leave, the greater her need is to stay. There is time yet, she tells herself, time yet before she cannot deny the ending is upon her for her to leave. Even though it hurts her, hurts them both, to stay in this limbo.

Contradictions.

Complications.

Sighing, she wills the thoughts that plague her to leave her in peace; that she might at least sleep for a few hours, fortify her emotional defenses before she must see him again. She freezes as she gets to her feet, suddenly aware of him – him - standing in the shadows on the catwalk above her; wonders how long he’s been there. How much he’s seen.

With the inexorable pull of gravity, her eyes are drawn to his, and they stare a moment, a long, long moment that seems like eternity, and she can see his desire to make things… not as they are; can see he’s on the verge of coming down to her, worry – concern – in his gaze. Her heart lurches in her breast, a tight, painful thump, and she tears her eyes away, her feet stumbling and ungainly as she propels herself to the stairs, racing, desperate to reach the shuttle before he can reach her.

The pull is just as strong as she reaches the catwalk and she can’t stop herself from looking. He hasn’t moved, only stands there, staring back at her, a resigned sadness in his gaze and she hesitates, knowing her behavior confuses him, hurts him. But as she looks back she sees none of that, only that sadness and a plea; a genuine plea, for her to just tell him, why? Why she’s running, what she’s afraid of; why she can’t tell him… and doesn’t she know, after all they’ve been through, that she can?

It makes her weak; weak for the wanting of his arms around her, for their comfort and strength; for the easing of her fear in sharing the truth. The words are on the tip of her tongue, her lips are even parting, breathe drawing in to speak…

Dying, I’m—

Death. The thought stops her; already so much death on this ship – Wash, Shepherd… She can’t do it; cannot add her name to that list, that burden to his heart.

Lips trembling she lets the breath go, closes her mouth in a firm line to keep the moisture that has pooled in her eyes from spilling over, and turns from him. She flees to the shuttle, caught once again by the triple-edged sword of fate.

Outside, his footsteps withdraw, and a tiny bit more of her dies.