Title: Out of the Shadow of the Valley

Author GoddessofBirth

Series: Dross-verse

Disclaimer: Nothing except the original parts

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The captain sat in the pilot's chair and stared out at the war ravaged landscape. The years had done little to heal it's wounds. His feet rested on the darkened console of the ship; she had not seen the sky in weeks. Behind him, the ship's corridors sat still, empty except for the echoing ghosts of the past, her family long having abandoned her and the captain to their fates.

The woman left first. He had desperately wanted her to stay, but when the time came, the words caught in his throat and she walked away without looking back. He watched her leave, and carefully bricked over the weakness she had created in his heart.

Next had been the son and daughter, driven to escape, stealing away in darkness and disappearing off world by morning's light.

The captain dropped his face into his hands. So many mistakes he had never learned how to repair.

The warrior had slipped away then, gone to rest at her husband's feet, the ship having become more of a tomb than her lover's grave.

Finally, all that remained were the doctor and the mechanic. The doctor worked feverishly, having lost half his heart the moment the daughter had gone, and the mechanic laboring just as hard to keep beating the other half she now held.

No matter how hard she travailed, the memories were too great and he slowly began to fade. Avenues exhausted, she made the final sacrifice to save him. The day they walked off the ship, no one acknowledged that she left half of her own heart behind the minute she hit dirt. They simply hoped their two halves would be enough to sustain the whole.

Alone and lost, the captain had brought the ship to rest here, at the place of her namesake, the cradle of his rebirth. Here he hoped to find the path, and if he couldn't, here he would stay. It was fitting, as he had never truly left.

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The woman stood on the scorched earth