relentless

Al, having missed out on, well, all of NLA's development (like, all of it, considering what's about to come down and blister out into nothingness), is leaning really heavily on the "playing catch-up" excuse. Exceptionally heavily. More heavily than anyone's ever leaned.

Meanwhile, consider that Elma has strong, broad shoulders. Elma won't fold for anyone. Elma will hold Al to the same standard she's always had for him, soft spot be damned. Elma's the only one who even knows what the standard is, anymore. Vandham and Nagi have been working on each other and Chausson for so long that they've probably forgotten.

Is it what it means to be a BLADE? No, more than that, it's what it means to uphold the unspoken promises they made to each other, about a shared commitment to humanity and a lost planet, then two, and the larger-than-life Skell binding the two.

The blueprints for that Skell are an interstellar marriage contract between alternate civilizations.

And that contract holds not a drop of Miran water. That contract knows nothing about Ma-non, about Zaruboggans, about Orphe and Prone.

Al's personality hasn't changed too deeply as a result of his time in the rift. He's still irreverent at the wrong times, overly committed at only some of the right ones.

What's she trying to say, here? What even is there to say?

Cold. Of course she's cold. Of course she's scared shirtless. Assuming that he was dead and gone had been the pivot point to reframe everything she did now. Al held Elma back to Earth. Mira pulls her forward into the future - and now he's here, too.

"You've gotta stay with me, Al," is all she says, a stern warning and a plea for backup in one. He's got to catch up right to the moment. He's got to be here and now with her.

No cutesy calls for his princess. She's colonel because she has to be, because there's no time not to throw that all away.