"Zash, I know you could have dealt with it alone, just. ... I'm glad I was here. Are you okay? Is there anything else I can do?"

Aaaand now his feelings are going to completely vanish because he does not want them to leak anymore. He really needs to watch himself or he's going to fall in love with her, hard.

Zash shakes his head again. "I don't think so. Just... takes a bit to get my heart to calm down but then I'm fine."

"Okay." Being cut off abruptly from the emotional outpouring kind of hurts, actually, but she is going to make a point of not being offended or upset at him about it. She makes an attempt to sit on her own emotions to not dump them on him, but she does not have his practice, so uh. Hopefully it's enough.

(She's sad and she misses him, but it's okay.)

".... Sandstorm's still going, unfortunately. So we can't go and see if Morgan's left us with our squishy feelings forever more, yet."

Yeah no his feelings are not safe right now, they need to be carefully managed and he can't do that while also using them communicatively.

"Yeah. Let's try to resume our interrupted sleep, then. Promise I won't wake you up again."

"Don't worry! If it does," she says, amused, "it just means that I'll make you drive. I warn you, it lists endlessly to the left, it's very annoying."

She goes to get resettled, then pauses. "... Um, do you still want to snuggle, or...?"

Would he rather have space?

WHY is she making him make a DECISION there he was perfectly happy to just not think about it at ALL and now he has to be RESPONSIBLE and THINK about it.

"If you're fine with the risk of another nightmare and still haven't gotten annoyed with the metal everywhere." Because the no self-flagellation rule is still in place and he does want the snuggles.

"Nope! It's better than freezing. C'mere."

He comes here. He's kind of touch-starved, which shouldn't be surprising but somehow it is.

So they snuggle up and see about getting back to sleep. The sound of the howling wind outside makes it seem like they're the only people in all the world.

It's kind of nice. He almost wishes it were true. It'd make some things a lot simpler, if so.

It's not quite dawn, yet, but the sandstorm has ended. Apparently she slept better than they did, or needs less of it.

"Oh look she's still around," mumbles Yvette, "yay..."

Zash looks similarly bleary and yawns. "I'm in my underwear," he calls, "but you've seen that already."

"Well get your pants on and get ready to get moving, we have a deadline to keep!"

"Yes, Mum," he whines, but yeah that's a good idea. He's not bleeding at all anymore and his clothes are grimy but what's new. He can get up and ready.

Yvette can also see about getting ready. Fortunately, she does actually have a change of clothes. Her old set can... go in a little pile of sadness for cleaning when they get to civilization. She'd thought about trying to get the blood out with what little hydrogen peroxide and bleach she has, but that'd also take a lot of water to clean, and a lot of effort, and, eh. It seemed better to wait. And if that means she doesn't have to try to get blood out of white clothes and can instead pay someone else to do it, great.

And then they can go out and face the day. Or, well, early morning.

"Grave's over there," says Morgan without preamble, lounging on the car like it's furniture and pointing.

Ah. Yeah.

He does want to visit it. And kneel by it, sitting on his heels and bowing deep.

It's a simple and unassuming, if rather large, cairn. There is a bit of scavenged metal that is used as a small makeshift marker, containing the name, 'Rollo.'

"Also since you took forever, we're bringing the cloth. I got bored. Tore it all down again. Guess we can attempt to do that whole clever selling thing our nerd mentioned, or just like, throw it at the first people we see."

He doesn't respond, and just stays there, head bowed, for a few minutes longer, before getting up again and nodding at her. "Sounds good," he says, a bit distractedly.

Yvette gives him a hug, but then they can get all of their stuff packed up and head out.

They've still got a long drive ahead of them.

Morgan... does not seem apologetic, exactly, but she is rather quiet from the backseat.

Zash notices.

"...I'm not mad at you, or upset. For what that's worth."

"Are you stupidly blaming yourself instead like a goddamned idiot."