@s1mon-pl600
It had been one month. One month since Markus had made the heart breaking decision to leave Simon on that rooftop alone with only a small pistol to defend himself. The choices he made he rarely regretted, but this one he found was eating at him from the inside out.
At first he took comfort in North, her soothing voice telling him ‘it had to be done’ and ‘there was no other way’ eased his guilty conscience for a time. When that no longer worked he found himself in Simon’s room at Jericho; touching the things that used to belong to Simon. He would run his hands over the wooden chair, particularly favoring the areas where the finish on the wood had been worn down knowing that those were the places that Simon touched too.
Markus used to tease Simon about the room that he kept. “ Why do you make the bed every day? “ He would pester Simon with silly little questions, sometimes messing up his room just to lovingly annoy his friend and chuckle kindly when Simon huffed and rightened it.
“Simon why do do all these things? Set a table with fresh flowers, make the bed every morning. We don’t even eat! ”
“ I want to Markus. It feels... nice.”
Markus stopped teasing when he heard Simon utter those three words. ‘ I want to ‘ it was the first time that he had heard of an Android wanting anything for themselves -- Other than himself. Markus wanted lots of things but that was because Carl taught him to want but to hear another Android say it? That’s when Markus knew he was in love with Simon. He knew he had complicated feelings for many Androids including Simon; but hearing him say those three little words cracked something in his code and the ‘great leader’ of the rebellion turned into putty for Simon.
That made it all the more painful when he had been pressured to leave Simon on the roof, he never even gathered the courage to tell Simon how he felt! And how could he? There was so much on the line, and things had been moving so fast, there was no time for love in a rebellion like this!
And yet now he was alone in Simon’s old room on the freighter laying on a musty old cot and stroking a damp pillow that he knew the other android had touched. Tears welled up in Markus’ eyes as he hugged the pillow closer and let out choked sobbed before burying his face into the heavy damp fabric.