The negotiation with Teacher Julies had been a humiliating defeat.
Sunny had stood in the instructor's office that morning, staring at the polished wood of the desk. The Academy projector was still sitting in his dorm room. He was supposed to return it at nine. It was currently nine-fifteen. Three days later that is.
"Sunless," Teacher Julies had said, amused. "I believe we agreed on a one-night loan."
"We did," Sunny replied, fighting the urge to fidget. "However, a situation has developed. I need it for longer."
Julies raised an eyebrow. "A situation? Is it vital to your studies?"
Sunny opened his mouth, then closed it. What reason could he probably give?! A sharp, warning pain flared behind his eyes.
'Damn flaw!!'
"I am watching a nine-part historical space drama with a girl," Sunny blurted out, his voice entirely too loud, his face instantly burning. "If I return the projector now, she will be disappointed. I do not want her to be disappointed. I want her to keep sitting next to me."
Julies stared at him for three very long seconds. Then, the older man smiled, picked up a pen, and extended the loan slip. "You have it for a week, my boy. Good luck with the space drama."
Sunny had grabbed the slip and fled the office, his dignity in absolute tatters.
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By noon, Sunny was standing in the center of his dormitory room, his hands were resting on his hips and he had a smile, surveying the space with profound disgust.
He had lived here for two weeks since returning from the Forgotten Shore. It was tiny, it smelled faintly of mildew and industrial cleaner, and the walls were so thin he could hear the guy next door brushing his teeth. But as of three hours ago, he was no longer a resident. The keys to his new, ridiculously expensive, utterly private house were currently burning a hole in his pocket.
A shadow shifted near the door. Cielle leaned against the frame, watching him pack. She was wearing her usual grey trousers and a dark tunic, her wings folded neatly against her back to avoid brushing against the cramped walls.
"You really don't own anything," she observed, taking a bite of a green apple she had procured from the cafeteria.
"I have exactly what I need," Sunny defended, tossing a few spare shirts and his single, flat pillow into a duffel bag.
Cielle looked at the sad, lumpy pillow. "That has terrible neck support. You're going to permanently damage your spine."
"I grew up sleeping on concrete, Cielle. A flat pillow is a luxury," Sunny grumbled, zipping the bag. "Besides, I'm rich now. I'm going to buy nice things. Soft things. Things that don't smell like sadness."
Cielle hummed thoughtfully. "Do you need help carrying it?"
"It's one bag and the projector," Sunny said, gesturing to the heavy device sitting on the desk. "I can manage."
"I can carry the projector," she offered. She stepped into the room, bypassing him completely, and picked up the bulky machine, holding it securely against her chest. "It's a long walk. And the bag looks heavy."
Sunny glared at her. "I am an awakened, Cielle. I can lift a car….. In fact i even beat fallen beast in a wrestling match"
Cielle blinked for a second, her eyes digging holes into his before she returned to normal
"I know. But I want to help," she stated simply, taking another bite of her apple.
Sunny sighed, feeling the fight completely leave him. He threw the duffel bag over his shoulder. "Fine. Let's go."
They swiftly walked out into the corridor, ready to leave the room behind for ever and ever. Sunny was locking the door behind him when the door across the hall opened. Pam, the tall, loud Awakened who lived opposite him, stepped out holding a mug of coffee. Right behind him was Leda, another Awakened from their cohort.
Pam stopped dead. His eyes flicked from Sunny with his overstuffed duffel bag, to Cielle, who was standing right next to him, dutifully holding the large, heavy projector against her chest.
A slow, incredibly amused grin spread across Pam's face. Leda raised both eyebrows.
"Moving out, Sunless?" Pam asked, leaning against his doorframe.
"Yes," Sunny said shortly, wanting to get out of this hallway as fast as possible. "Got my own place."
Leda looked at Cielle, then at the projector, then back to Sunny. "Wow. Didn't realize you two were moving so fast. Got a whole house, huh?"
Sunny froze. Wait. He realized exactly how this looked. He was walking out of his bedroom with a bag of clothes, followed by a very pretty girl who was helping him carry his stuff out of the building.
"It's not-" Sunny started, his face instantly heating up. "She's not…. we aren't moving in together! She's just helping me carry the projector!"
Pam held up his hands in mock surrender, though the grin didn't leave his face. "Hey, man. I'm not judging. The Dream Realm is a nightmare. Life is short. If you found a girl willing to carry your heavy electronics to your new love nest, you lock that down."
"It is not a love nest!" Sunny hissed, desperately trying to deflect "It's a tactical stronghold with good plumbing!"
Cielle, who had been quietly eating her apple, finally looked at Pam. She swallowed her bite and tilted her head, trying to be helpful and clarify the situation.
"I'm just carrying this so he saves his energy for tonight," Cielle said, her voice completely deadpan "And I'm not moving in. I just want to see his new bed. He said it's much bigger."
Leda choked on her coffee. Pam stared at her for a second, his jaw dropping, before he burst out into loud, echoing laughter.
"Right! Save his energy for tonight! Got it!" Pam wheezed, clapping the wall. "You two have fun! Try not to break the new walls, Sunless!"
Sunny stood in the hallway, his face burning with the heat of a miniature sun. His soul had completely left his body. He opened his mouth to correct her, to explain that she meant saving energy for watching movies, but his brain was short-circuiting so hard he couldn't form words.
His shadow detached itself from the wall, walked over, and patted his leg in mock sympathy.
"Walk," Sunny whispered to Cielle, staring blankly ahead. "Just walk."
"He seemed nice," Cielle noted as they headed for the stairs.
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By the time they reached his new house, it was raining again.
Cielle stepped inside, looking around the spacious, pristine living room. She immediately zeroed in on the massive, incredibly expensive leather couch Sunny had purchased. She sat down like a cat, much to Sunny's amusement, and shifted her weight, then she frowned. She wriggled a bit, her wings bunching up awkwardly against the stiff leather.
"This is hostile," she declared.
Sunny sighed, the embarrassment from the hallway finally fading into familiar acceptance. He dropped his bag, grabbed three fluffy throw pillows, and arranged them into a soft gap in the center of the couch. "Try now."
She slid back into the gap. Her wings settled comfortably into the pillows. A tiny, pleased smile tugged at the corner of her lips. "Acceptable."
He did not ask her why she did not just dismiss them or something, he had assumed them to be some sort of special memory or echo. He had never really seen her without them, like they were a part of her. He liked that a little, it gave him a little indicator of her mood.
They set up the projector. They had a lot of ground to cover.
During The Phantom Menace, Cielle was mostly confused by the timeline. When young Anakin showed off C-3PO, Cielle had paused her popcorn chewing. "He built a droid with exposed wiring for a desert planet? The sand is going to ruin its joints in a week. That's a terrible design."
During Attack of the Clones, when Anakin gave his infamous monologue about disliking sand, Cielle had actually nodded in agreement. "Finally. He says something logical. Sand is a massive liability for footwork, plus it gets everywhere"
But by the time the third film started, the concept of "personal space" in Sunny's new living room had undergone a quiet but systematic degradation.
There was plenty of room on the large couch. Yet, over the last four hours, Cielle had slowly migrated. Now, well past two in the morning, she was sitting close enough that her left wing, hanging loose over the pillows, occasionally brushed against Sunny's arm.
He noticed. His shadow definitely noticed. Sunny told the shadow to stop acting like a parasite. The shadow ignored him and politely shifted its shape to give her wing more room.
Then there was the issue of the snack economy.
Cielle was currently on her fourth bag of popcorn. Sunny had stopped trying to understand where the mass was going. For someone who was roughly the size of a stiff breeze, her caloric intake during Star Wars was terrifying. But she had finished her stash an hour ago and had seamlessly transitioned to raiding his.
She didn't even ask. She just extended a hand, blindly navigating the dark, and plunged it into his bucket.
Sunny silently moved the bucket to his right side.
A minute later, her hand drifted over, patted his left knee, felt the empty air where pop corn should be, and simply reached across his lap to find the bucket on his right side. She took a handful, brought it back across him, and ate it, her green eyes completely locked on the screen where General Grievous was pulling out four lightsabers.
"Four arms," Cielle murmured around a mouthful of stolen popcorn. "That's just stupid."
"He's a cyborg," Sunny whispered back. "He has four lightsabers. That's a massive increase in lethality."
"No, it's a structural nightmare," she corrected easily. "Look at how he has to bend his wrists to spin those things. His whole chest is completely exposed. You could just stab him right down the middle while he's busy showing off."
Obi-Wan promptly shot Grievous directly in the exposed chest.
Cielle let out a small, satisfied hmph and reached across Sunny's lap again. Sunny sighed, gave up on his dignity, and just moved the bucket back to the middle so she wouldn't have to reach as far.
The tone of the film darkened. The Republic fell. The clones turned on the Jedi. On screen, a young padawan stepped out from behind the council chairs, looking up at Anakin.
"Master Skywalker, there are too many of them. What are we going to do?"
Anakin ignited his lightsaber.
Sunny braced himself. He glanced sideways at Cielle, expecting a flinch.
Cielle was chewing her loot with any change, he sighed.
"Well," she said, her voice completely flat. "That solves the overcrowding issue."
Sunny stared at her. "The what?"
"The overcrowding in the temple," she repeated practically. "There were too many of them. The kid just said so. Anakin is just cleaning the place out."
"He's killing children!" Sunny wheezed, "That is the tragedy of the whole story!"
Cielle finally turned her head to look at him. Her eyes were completely serene, holding a chilling, deep look "He was told to clear out the building. They were in the building. What did you expect him to do, Sunny? Politely ask them to leave? They have weapons."
Sunny stared at her. "You're a monster," he said quietly.
"I'm just being realistic," she countered with a tiny shrug. "Besides, if a whole temple full of trained fighters can't survive one guy who complains about sand all the time, their training was garbage. They brought this on themselves."
Sunny rubbed the bridge of his nose. "Just... watch the movie," he muttered.
Then came the climax. Obi-Wan stood on the black sandbank.
"It's over, Anakin! I have the high ground!"
Cielle paused with a handful of popcorn halfway to her mouth. She tilted her head. "Does that actually matter?"
"Does what matter?"
"The high ground." She looked at Sunny, genuinely curious. "They can move things with their minds. He could just pull the ground out from under him. Or throw a big rock. Why does standing on a hill mean he automatically wins?"
"Because–" Sunny started, then stopped. He frowned. "It's symbolic," he tried to say.
"It's a stupid plot device written to force a dramatic ending!" Sunny blurted out, wincing and grabbing his head.
Cielle watched him massage his temples. She didn't ask about the sudden outburst. She just accepted the answer. "Okay. So Obi-Wan is just hoping Anakin does something stupid."
"You underestimate my power!" Anakin yelled on screen.
Anakin leaped. Obi-Wan swung at a perfect angle. Anakin rolled down the ash bank, suddenly missing several limbs.
Cielle let out a small, immensely satisfied breath. "Yep. He did something stupid."
She leaned back into the couch cushions. "You really liked that part, didn't you?" Sunny asked.
"He was annoying," Cielle stated simply. "And he didn't give Han Solo a medal."
"Han Solo isn't born yet!"
"The principle still stands."
The projector light illuminated her face perfectly. The smug, entirely justified little nod she gave the wall was so ridiculous that Sunny, acting entirely without thinking, pulled his communicator out of his pocket.
He opened the camera. Click.
Cielle blinked, turning to him as the faint shutter sound went off. "Did you just take a picture of me?"
Sunny froze.trying to hold it in, yet the pain eventually made him gasp out.
"Yes," He rubbed his temples furiously. "Yes, I did. You looked ridiculously smug about a man burning in lava and I wanted proof."
"Proof?"
"Proof of the menace you are"
Cielle considered this. "Okay," she said softly, completely unbothered, and turned back to the screen.
The credits finally began to roll. The blue light washed over the quiet living room. The rain outside had started up again, tapping gently against the large windows.
He looked over at Cielle.
Because they were Awakened, their bodies didn't require normal sleep. To actually sleep, they had to enter a pod and project their consciousness into the Dream Realm. But mental fatigue was still very real.
Cielle was staring at the scrolling text, but her eyes were unfocused. Her wings had draped down, the tips resting softly against the leather of the couch. She looked small, quiet, and inexplicably comfortable in his space.
Slowly, without looking at him, Cielle tilted her head sideways. It was a minute movement, just a slight shift in gravity. Her eyes slipped shut, her breathing slowing as she entered a light, meditative trance to rest her overstimulated mind.
Her head came to rest against his shoulder.
Sunny stopped breathing.
Every muscle in his body locked. His heart beat so fast he was genuinely worried she would feel it through his shirt.
She wasn't looking at him. Sunny now knew that she didn't understand the romantic implications of what she was doing. To her, he was just warm, solid, and safe. The weight of her head was light, her soft orange hair brushing against his neck.
His shadow, currently sprawled on the floor, gave him a very distinct, very mocking thumbs-up.
Sunny swallowed hard. He didn't move an inch. He just stared straight ahead at the scrolling blue names, painfully aware of the soft, even breathing against his arm, the faint scent of ozone and rain from her hair, and the terrifying, world-shattering realization that he didn't want her to move.
"Are there more?" she murmured softly, her eyes still closed, half in her trance.
Sunny stared at the blue light. He thought about the Chained Isles waiting for them in the dark, and the very real possibility of dying there.
"Yeah," Sunny said softly, carefully adjusting his arm so she would be a little more comfortable. "There are more."