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He woke up, the dream already fading from his memory. The room was silent, save for the soft and comforting whirrs of the machine’s fans ever so gently blowing warm air as it slept. Gabriel held a breath, tenderly hugging the machine tighter to himself as not to disturb its slumber, and exhaled deeply.
Then, slowly, he sat up, the thin blanket falling to his lap. Their room was still bathed in deep blues, greys and cyans as the moon shone through the balcony window, Kitr splayed on the ground, bathing in the moonlight as she slept by the open door. The angel silently made his way over, making sure not to disturb her slumber as he stepped past her and out into the summer night.
It was cooler than usual and Gabriel inhaled deeply, the sweet smell of flowers, herbs and distant rain filling his senses. Sighing, he crossed his arms onto the railing and rested his head, observing the almost-full moon as it shone in the lightly veiled sky. She was still low, too low for him to stay awake until dawn. A weird dream had woken him up, neither good or bad, just… weird. He couldn’t even remember it anymore, just flashes of a bright room and talking to someone and it not being right even with V1 by his side. No, not V1, it was identical, yes, but something felt off, as if the thing holding his hand wasn’t the machine he had come to love. That was what woke him up.
A brush of soft fur and an inquisitive “mrrp” pulled him back from his thoughts. Kitr was looking up at him, tail held high, the tip gently swaying left and right. Gabriel crouched, the cat taking the gesture as a signal of pets to come and immediately starting to brush her side against his knee. Gabriel chuckled softly, gently petting her down her back and scratching her forehead, her head rising to the touch, eyes closed in pure bliss.
The angel ended up sitting on the cool marble, legs crossed and back to the doorframe with Kitr on his lap, asleep once more after taking her fill of cuddles.
Once again, Gabriel was pulled back to reality, this time by gentle rustling and a slightly alarmed beep. The machine was looking around the room, scanning for him, shoulders tense and optic wide until it finally locked eyes with him. Seeing his angel and Kitr, the former still absentmindedly stroking the latter’s side, V1 relaxed, fans whirring just a bit louder for the tiniest fraction of a second; a sigh of relief in its own way. With a soft, almost needy whine and a tilt of its head, the machine opened its arms in an invitation to come back to bed. With Kitr’s disapproval (that she made sure was known by digging her claws into Gabriel’s thigh as he moved her to the ground) the angel stood back up, glanced once more at the slowly rising moon and her thin clouds, breathed one last breath of summer breeze and went back inside.
The bedsheets had cooled by now, and they felt like bliss under Gabriel’s warmer skin as he laid back down in bed next to his lover. V1 looked at him, still propped up on an elbow, its head cocked to the side in concern. Not wanting to disturb the silence by speaking, Gabriel placed an arm around the machine’s shoulder and gently tugged it into a hug. V1 followed easily.
Legs tangled together under white sheets, gold and cyan wings draped over both bodies, mechanical fingers carding through unruly feathers, ebony digits gently tracing over wires and metal plates, soft breaths and humming fans melting together in the warm summer night, angel and machine closed their eyes and sleep claimed them once more, enveloped in each other’s love.