Archive of Our Own ^beta

Eiffels eyes slowly heaved open, his eyes readjusting to the darkness of a room he did not recognise. His vision was blurry and dark around the edges, and as soon as he woke up he felt like he'd been hit in the head with a crowbar. 

He groaned, before quickly unstrapping himself from the bed and pushing off of it, trying to make an attempt at figuring out where the hell he was. Was he… safe? What…where… was everyone?    

"E-eiffel?" Heras voice sounded overhead, immediately scaring him from his train of thought. 

"Agh- Hera! where… " he said, rubbing his head and blinking before looking around for the camera.

"You're awake!"  

"Noooo this is actually all a dream" he cooed, making a strange impression of a ghost and wiggling his fingers.

Something told he her wasn’t entirely joking.

"Uhuh. Sure. You're in the Urania." She hesitated, but didn't say anything else. She wasn't sure if this was Eiffel, let alone if he was ready to know everything that had happened. 

"A-are you okay?" She asked, looking at how Eiffel held his hand to his head, wincing.

She couldn't help but notice how this… person sounded like Eiffel. He wasn't like a zombie, like how Pryce was when she wandered into the Urania, no. He was like himself. She didn't want to get her hopes up, but maybe… no. No, it couldn't be. 

"What? I mean, yeah, aside from the fact i've got this killer headache and I have no idea how I got here. Last thing I remember I was… oh" He trailed off, looking down at his hands absent mindedly.  

"What do you-you remember?" She asks, hoping Eiffel didn't notice how she couldn't keep her voice still. How she couldn't restrain the hope that anxiously bubbled up within her.  

"Uhh…  I suppose Doctor Evil was trying to take the aliens secret special recipie from my brain, and then suddenly I end up, well... here," he found himself pausing to breathe for a moment, as sharp anxiety bubbled up his sternum. "Is it… over?" 

"Yeah, yeah it is"

Eiffel sighed, but the relief didn't come. He just felt heavy. 

"Do you remember me?" she asked, quieter this time. Almost nervously. Eiffel felt how his stomach sank slightly when he looked towards the camera, but he gave her a soft smile.

"Yeah. I do, sweetheart. I remember all of you."   

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Renee Minkowski floated idly in the common room of the Urania. She felt lost. She didn't know what to do with herself, now that there was no life or death situation to face, no emergency, nobody on a death mission to look after, nothing.

She checked the time. 04:00. Great. Another sleepless night. It was no use even trying, she knew what would happen, she knew that she would just end up doing whatever she was doing now, just strapped into a sofa this time. 

Renee didn't realise how much it would hurt that Eiffel is gone. He was an idiot, and sometimes a jackass, but he was her crew member. And her friend. And she failed him. She failed him, and hell, she even failed Hilbert. She was supposed to get them out alive, and as far as she was aware, the Eiffel she knew was dead. All that was left was his body and his name, lying unconscious for almost a month in the bed of the person that she had killed.

How ironic.

The old, well-known feeling of emptiness had crept upon her more and more as the days went on without him. Some part of her told her she deserved it. Told her she deserved it for killing Jacobi's best friend and not being able to save his commanding officer. Something within her felt like she was responsible for him and his crew too. And that he failed them just as bad. 

They were stupid and self centered parts of herself. Nobody deserved anything that happened. Nothing could fix what she had done. Or what she hadn't

The first time this had happened, Eiffel came back victorious. Traumatised with a lack of hair and nails, but alive. He was hismelf. And the hole in the crew could finally be filled. For that moment, it was truely okay. Day by day, she found herself hoping that this would happen again. 

It was stupid. She had seen what had happened to Pryce. If nothing was left of her, why would there be anything of Eiffel?

Her train of thought was suddenly broken by the creak of a door opening behind her. She felt a sudden spike of adrenaline as she wipped around to see who it was, and felt her hand immediately slip to the spot on her belt where she would normally carry a gun. 

She blinked. What…? Floating before her was one, brittle and pale, Douglas F Eiffel. 

"Commander!" He yelled, his same stupid grin spreading on his face. "missed me?" 

"Eiffel," she breathed "is that…  you?"

"The one and only- ah!" he was suddenly pushed by Minkowski, who had just launched herself off the opposite wall into Eiffel, and wrapped her arms around him as tight as she could as though he was a lifeline keeping her afloat.

"You idiot" she breathed from the spot on his neck that she had pushed her head into.

Eiffel made an amused noise, before wrapping his arms around Minkowski. He didn't say anything about how her arms were wrapped so tight around him that his ribs hurt. He just let himself enjoy it. This sort of thing wouldn't usually happen in a million years.

It was an eternity before Renee eventually willed herself to let go of him. She wiped her now slightly damp eyes, before looking blankly at Eiffel. 

"I'm sorry, that wasn't very-" she started, but she was quickly interrupted. 

"Minkowski, its okay," He paused for a moment and ran his hand through his hair "Besides, we're friends now, right?" 

"You… remember us?" she asked, half to herself.

"Yeah. I do. Memories a bit rough around the edges but, I remember all of you." he said, and he was sincere. Renees lips curled up into a smile.

Eiffel couldn't help but notice the dark circles under Minkowskis eyes. How she could bearly keep them open. How her body felt like a sack of potatos in his embrace.

He smiled. Its his turn now, he supposed. 

"Eiffel, why are you- agh! What are you-" she suddenly found herself being dragged into the quarters Eiffel had just emerged from. She made few fleeting efforts to escape his grasp but, if she were to be honest, she wasn't sure if she really wanted too. 

She told herself it was because she didn't want to fight Eiffel while he was in that state. But she knew that wasn't really the full story. A part of her knew that she just didn't want to be let go. Not yet. She would take any more moments in the warmth of another person over returning to floating around in the depths of her mind.

And now, as she found herself strapped into the bed, with Eiffel sat next to her, she just couldn't keep her eyes open for any longer. 

"Wait-" she muttered, partially to herself. She couldn't fall asleep yet, she had things to do, she needed… she…  

Eiffel watched as she went out like a light. It struck him how... normal all of this felt. How cozy it was. 

Cozy. Not a word he thought he would ever use to describe being stuck in a tin can lightyears away from home, in a place that would've immediately killed him if he'd as much as went out the door without his Cactus Jumper on of a spacesuit on, but here he was. And it was true.

He was safe. And he was going home.