For some reason he's feeling very tired, now. 

- oh, his unscaffolded Gate is still up. Silly. Leareth takes it down. 

He looks around, at the now-empty grass. Empty except for some chopped up bits of his baby other self. No point in trying to - salvage anything - now, and it's not like those fragments of slug-flesh are Mhalir, anymore. 

Leareth turns away from it and starts walking, in the direction of the Gate-terminus, though he's not doing a lot of planning about it right now. 

- oh, right, he should probably communicate. :Nerefir: he reaches out. :Situation seems under control. Matirin escorting Alloran back, Melody with Cayaldwin: 

Matirin walks Alloran to the Gate and tells someone to walk him through it and then turns around and heads back towards Leareth. He is feeling - guilty for leaving Leareth, but that is silly, Alloran being there was making the situation complicated and getting Alloran out of there was important. 

Now he can hurry, though. He does, even though he is not sure what he is hurrying to do.

Leareth feels him coming; he's still running on battle nerves enough to instinctively have all of his Othersenses open, even though the inside of his head feels raw and the constant rush of information hurts.

He turns his gaze to sort-of-focus on Matirin, walks toward him and tries to say something, but he feels very far away from his body, from everything, and it's correspondingly difficult for words to make it all the way from thought to speech, if they're not orders, giving orders to secure a threat is easy, this - isn't...  

:I was not careful enough: he finally manages, as Matirin reaches him. 

<We were not. We - were aware of a potential threat and we assumed Alloran would not go to these lengths to be in a position to carry it out. I am sorry.>

The situation is not an emergency anymore and this is much harder. 

:I should -: Leareth starts, unsteadily, and then trails off and stumbles against Matirin, suddenly feeling too tired and heavy to support his weight. Possibly he should morph or something, he's thinking vaguely, but the thought doesn't turn into any particular impetus to action, because Matirin is here and so he doesn't need to be on top of maintaining security and so his mind is no longer giving him those emergency reserves. 

<We should go somewhere. Your apartment, maybe. Not here. I think I could support your weight but not if you do that, you'd have to do it in the style Heralds ride Companions.>

:I can walk: If there's a plan then Leareth still has enough energy he can summon to execute on it. He orients to his surroundings again, this time remembering which way his room is, and he drags himself upright and starts walking. 

Matirin sticks close by him and doesn't say anything. There is not much to say.

They reach Leareth's apartment and he stumbles in. Stops just inside the door, leans on the wall and ends up sort of sliding down to sit on the floor, putting his head down on his knees. 

:He trusted me: he says, pointlessly. :To - keep him safe...: 

<I'm so sorry.> He lowers himself carefully to the ground next to him; he could morph but this seems like maybe a quadruped-petting occasion.

Leareth leans on him, lets his cheek rest against Matirin's warm soft fur. It's - certainly better than not, having him here, not being confusedly in pain alone, but it doesn't actually make it hurt less, that isn't the point. 

Leareth doesn't cry very often, but this seems like an occasion where it's the appropriate response. He's still having trouble relaxing enough to fully have emotions, though. The lingering adrenaline still has him on edge, his Othersenses instinctively focused on the room around him. Matirin's mind, shielded behind his amulet. He keeps bouncing away from the place in his mind where ( - the memory of a Tower against the stars - ) lives, because once he goes there ( - never to die never to give up never to walk away - ) he's not going to be very well prepared to respond to emergencies, for a while, and his hindbrain is still waiting for sufficient evidence that this has stopped behind that kind of emergency.

:Not - entirely lost: he says, raggedly. :Brain scan backup. Know where it is. We can - try - to get him back: 

But it's a couple of years old, recent in the grand scheme of things but predating the war, even if they can manage to run it, Mhalir won't have any idea who he is - who Cayaldwin is - and it won't ever be the same... 

<We will do that.> He pats Leareth, cautiously. <It will not make this all right but we will do it anyway.>

:...I am not even angry with him: Alloran, he means. :Maybe - should be - but I cannot see the point: He chuckles, bitterly, halfway to a sob. :He was very clever and determined: 

Patpatpat. <I am not either, really. He - was someone who would do this. We decided to try to get what we wanted by making sure he didn't have the opportunity and we didn't succeed. There will be an inquiry but - it all feels a little impervious to anger. He would have done it no matter what we did afterwards.>

:Yes: 

Leareth shivers and shifts closer to Matirin, running his hands through his fur. He tries to relax. It feels dangerous, which is stupid, Alloran is back on Earth and Leareth's room is warded and besides he was never the one who anyone among Matirin's people wanted dead, he won the war for them. 

Eventually, slowly, the tension eases out of him, and the itchy unnamed pain transmutes to grief, darker and sharper-edged but easier to look at head-on. 

:I miss him. I - it feels as though he ought be right there, my mind - expects to have him in my head again tomorrow...: But he won't, not ever again. 

He cries, quietly. 

<Death feels very - broken, very - unlike everything else in the universe - it is too absolute, and it happens too easily ->

:I hate it. I have always hated it. Want to make it. Stop. Happening. Two thousand years, in Velgarth, and - everyone I ever met, died, over and over. Thought - we were close - to fixing it...: 

<We were close. Are close. So close. I'm so sorry.>

:Not going to give up. We can still...: He trails off. :Worried about Cayaldwin. Need his help: For figuring out how in all hells to run Mhalir's brain on a computer, is mainly what he's thinking of, but he sort of means all of it. 

<Yes. He was - leaning on this. I hadn't realized how much, maybe. It wasn't smart of him. I think he will pull himself together enough to help you figure out how to run the backup.>

:Hope so. Not sure - it will even help, for him...: His breath sighs out. :He will not know who I am. Mhalir. He will be so confused and so scared, and, just–:

<How old is the backup?>

:About two and a half years. Most of his life - all his work on the immortality setup, I think also some encrypted files on it. It was after he took over the invasion on Earth, so that part will make sense to him, but it long predates our arrival, of course: 

<Mmmm. We should make some more copies, put them in other places.>

:Yes, definitely: Shudder. :I - Matirin, I cannot think about the future more right now, I need...: He's very unsure of what. :Just to be with you. I keep feeling - very alone - and I know I am not, anymore, it is different now, just...: