Don't Let Go

"Rich!"

There was nothing but silence around her. The air felt strangely...full. Oppressive, like it was pressing in on all sides, choking her. She could barely breathe.

"Rich! Oh God, oh God."

She didn't even recognize her own voice, it seemed foreign to her own ears. Each word spoken was muffled, drowned out by the heavy beat of her heart and her halting footsteps. Every step she took she had to struggle, pushing debris out of the way, sharp pieces of wood and metal scratching her legs as she walked. And she had been walking.

For so long.

"Rich!"

She began to wonder if it was her hearing that was the problem, or if her voice was simply giving out. Her heart was growing louder every second. Every terrifying second.

"Rich!"

Rich, Rich, oh please, please. Her throat was tearing itself apart, but she needed to find him. She wrapped her arms closer around herself. A piece of cracked, torn metal cut through her shoe and sliced into her foot. She fell. She braced herself on her arms and began to push herself back up.

"Liz?"

She whipped around, falling down once more, though this time in a sitting position. Relief swarmed her, making her feel light-headed, making the thump thump of her heart so loud.

"Rich" She whispered, her voice cracked and ugly.

His eyes were wide, showing the unnatural green color, though they were human in every other way. His tall form blurred a little in front of her eyes. He stooped down and gently helped her stand, hands gently grasping her elbows and bringing her up against him. He didn't let go of her.

"Oh, Liz." She had never heard him so sad before. "Liz, why would you even consider..."

She wrapped her arms around him and pressed her head against his chest. The lack of any heartbeat from his own chest, what would have once been unnerving, was now comforting; pleasantly at odds with her own raging heart. She had been so frightened when she had first heard that silence.

---
"What the- you don't have a heart?!"

"That's not what I said, Liz. Perhaps you are confused?"

She huffed and threw the screwdriver she had been holding at him, which hit him on the arm and cut him slightly, causing him to yelp.

"Elizabeth! Was that necessary?" He frowned at the cut on his arm, and the blue blood running down from it. Almost exactly like human blood, he had explained to her, except it didn't change color when exposed to oxygen. Or, at least, that's what she had gotten from the scientific jargon he had spouted off.

"Completely necessary. What are you doing?"

"Adjusting my body's healing rate." He said, looking down at the cut on his arm, holding his other hand over it, eyes narrowed and concentrated.

"Moving on, then. And doesn't everything need a heart?"

"I am not a 'thing', Liz. And I do have a heart. It is just located elsewhere."

"'Elsewhere'? What, you keep it in a box inside your spaceship?" She looked up from the hovercraft she had been tinkering with and grinned at him.

"My heart is closer to my lower back, actually." He came up to her and knelt in front of where she was sitting, before taking one of her hands and placing it where he had said. Her mouth fell open almost comically when she felt the heartbeat underneath her fingertips. She spread her hand flat against his back and felt the slightest shiver run through him. He was very close to her in that moment, and the intimacy of the touch surprised her a little. She pulled her hand away and grinned at him.

"If you wanted me to feel you up, all you had to do was ask."

"Your eloquence stuns me, Elizabeth. Though, I wonder..."

"What?"

"If I had said that I didn't know what you meant by the phrase "feel you up", would you have given me a hands-on example?" He grinned at her slightly stunned expression.

"Who the heck have you been talking to."

"I don't understand what you are implying, Liz."

"Aliens aren't allowed to be sarcastic. Or... flirty."

"That last word is not in my vocabulary."

"Like hell it isn't, Rich. Who- you know what, forget it. And pass me that screwdriver, I need it."

"I believe that I would be more inclined to grant your request if a 'please' preceded it." He handed over the screwdriver anyways, fingers lingering slightly on her fingers as they touched.
---

"Thank you." His voice was so soft. "As selfish as it may seem, Elizabeth... I did not want to do this alone."

"Don' call m' that." She mumbled against his chest. The sound of her voice, still so ugly and broken, made her angry. She needed to scream at him, be angry with him. She needed to convince him.

He laughed. So softly. When she had first heard him laugh was when she began thinking of him as human. Her mother called her idiotic, but she didn't regret it. His laughter undid her.

"It's stupid!" She looked up at him as she spoke, meeting his eyes defiantly, sadly. "They're all just, so, so stupid! Rich, please, you don't have to do any of this, they don't deserve it!"

"Shh, Elizabeth, you're not making much sense."

"'m making perfect sense."

He sighed, and looked around him at all the destruction and chaos. His arms hadn't left her. Not yet.

"I will never..." He began, his voice faltering a little. "Never understand you earthlings. Liz, this is best for everyone."

"No, it's not. You told me, told me that you wanted to stay here. You shouldn't have to leave."

"No one is forcing me, Elizabeth. This decision is my own."

"That's a lie. And you know it."

"...Can't you let me lie, Elizabeth, just this once? I would like to pretend that I do not have to let go of you."

"You don't have to."

"Elizabeth..."

"Stop calling me that."

He pressed his lips into her hair, caked in dirt though it was, and sighed.

"I can't... I can't stand the thought of you leaving." She said, biting her lip as she hid her face from him. "We can go and explain things to everyone, you don't have to go, they'll understand, they have to."

"You cannot judge them by what you would do, Elizabeth. The world is not as forgiving as you are."

"'m not a forgiving person."

"Liar." He whispered against her hair, bringing her a little closer. "You've forgiven me for this entire mess."

"Wasn't your fault."

"It was."

"Take me with you." The sudden demand stunned her as much as it did him, seeming to burst out of her. She hadn't even really considered such a thing before now.

"Such a thing would be impossible."

She was silent, and held on a little tighter to his shirt, letting her arms fall from where they had been wrapped around his shoulders to his lower back, feeling the soft thump thump of his heart.

"You can't hold onto someone forever, Liz. You taught me that when you gave me my first hug, remember?"

"I taught it wrong. Letting go is optional."

"Ah. Well, if that is the case, then you will not mind me holding on a little longer?"

"You don't have to let go, Rich."

"Liz."

"You don't have to let go."