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Izutsa curled up next to the toilet in her private ‘fresher' and leaned against the wall. Tears started welling up again. She’d been crying off and on for hours. At this point, it just hurt. ‘Why was this happening? What had she done to deserve this? She tried, she really tried to be a good person. To do her job better than anyone else and so protect her people. By the karking ice, she’d managed to save millions of lives. Surely that outweighed what she had to do in the course of her duties as a cipher.
It had been humiliating. She’d thought she’d been handling the side effects, and the panic and the hurt that came with Kothe knowing about that damn code, knowing more about her mind then she did. But then the hallucinations, she knew now they were hallucinations, had shown up. It had felt so real, all those people, here on her ship taunting her, making her relive some of the most uncomfortable moments of her career in intelligence. Faces that weren’t supposed to be here sitting around everywhere. She’d felt like she was going crazy, actually losing her mind and the thought had scared her almost as much as the hallucinations. And then Jadus… and she couldn’t, just couldn’t deal with that. The memories, the pain, it had been too much.
She was supposed to be the strong one. The one the rest of her crew could follow, the one they could lean on, could trust to always figure out the solution. She’d collapsed in front of them. Made them carry her to medbay, stand around and stare and worry as she fought her way through her own nightmare. The worry she saw on Vector's face, that was something she never wanted to see again. Even Kaliyo and Fifteen, for all they pretended not to care, seemed concerned. She wasn’t ok with this. She couldn’t do anything about it though. She didn’t know how to undo this. She didn’t know anything. She couldn’t stop crying. She couldn’t stop being sick.
She just wanted all of it to stop, she wanted to belong to herself again. Her thoughts started spiraling again when she finally processed the steady presence at her side. She blinked aside the last of the moment’s tears to clearly see Vector sitting next to her, close but not touching her and watching with a soft, but sad expression. He looked at her and noticing she’d finally recognized him, he lifted his arm slightly.
Izutsa could see the opening, a safe place, a haven for her to hide in and pushed herself quickly into his arms. They’d been becoming closer lately. He might technically be part of a hive mind and no conversation or moment was ever really private, but she’d found that somehow, with Vector that didn’t matter and she was accepting the nest as part of him. He felt stable and steady, warm and wild, he felt like home and she was certain she was falling in love with him.
“We are worried about you, Zut. You are not yourself.” She’d explained how Chiss names worked to him a few days before. The parts that build the core name and how it was made up of parts from the family name, the given name, the third name. He’d called her by her given name later. He asked if it was ok, which was adorable. He only ever did so in private, whispering it like it was something precious. “Please, we wish to help with what burden you are carrying.”
She sighed, oh how she wished she could explain, could tell this sweet, gentle, man what was wrong. “I can’t tell you, Vector. I truly wish I could, but I can’t. I want to, but I can’t”
“We do not understand, but there are many things in your job that are secret. We will not pry.”
He thought she was keeping it a secret because of ‘confidentiality’ or ‘top-secret status’. He’d think she didn’t trust him and she couldn’t do anything about it. She clutched his robes, twisting and hiding her face suddenly scared that he’d leave that, he’d take this safety, the only solace she had and leave. That she’d never again see his smile or hear his tales of life in the nest. “Please don’t leave. I trust you, I promise. I would tell you if I was capable. Please don’t go.”
One of his hands that had been sitting so solidly on her back, a grounding presence, moved to stroke through her hair. “We are not upset with you. We are not leaving you.”
He somehow always knew just what to say. It didn’t fix things, but just the reassurance that he would be here, it soothed her. She hurt just a bit less.
“I can’t do this without you. It’s too much.”
“You could Zut. You are stronger than you believe yourself to be. But we are pleased you want us here.” He held her just a bit tighter and pressed a soft kiss to the top of her head as the warmth and finally feeling a little bit safer lulled the exhausted agent into an uneasy sleep.