[ That's better. Laughter is better, even if wrung of its intensity by fatigue. Fatigue is also fine. Fatigue, fear, distrust... they can all be overcome with the right touch, if someone is willing to meet him where he stands. It doesn't even have to be halfway. It can just be this: a feeling, a chance, the half-light of his honesty echoing in the radiant dark. ]

I'm glad. [ His touch traces something on the back of Choi's hand. ] Is that why you kept it?

[ Their tether. ]

Even though I thought... it'd be fine. If you snapped it the moment the fighting was over.

[ Instead, it's become what allows him to be here. It's what allows him to find him every time, no matter how maligned the moonlight is. By his side on the bench. Sunken down into the tempestuous flutter of his soul, transmuting the sigil he draws on his hand from the physical to the spiritual. ]

I resolved to let you do that, if that's what you wanted.

[ Yet he hadn't. ]