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Lana Del Rey's Queen of Disaster hummed from the Orbiter's speakers. The lighting was soft and low, with a projector rotating flowers across the ceiling in sweetheart pastels. A diffuser in the corner suffused the air with the scent of lavender. Everything was meant to be conducive for a rare daytime nap. The excuse was Excalibur had recently added a new bed to the Orbiter, never been slept in, and he wanted you to try it out. Really, it had more to do with the fact that your insomnia had been acting up again, and you were having difficulty sleeping for any amounts of time at all.
Lacing his fingers through yours, Excalibur chuffed at you and tugged you after him, leading you to the back room. "You're going to love it," he promised. "I even got those weighted blankets you like."
You grinned up at him. "This feels like you're trying to manipulate me into getting some rest. Not that I'm complaining. You'll be joining me, of course?"
Excalibur stroked his thumb over your knuckles. "Yes," he said. "It's the only way you'll stay in bed."
You rolled your eyes. He wasn't wrong, though. Taking naps during the day always made you feel guilty, and anyway, you could never fall asleep. You'd end up scrolling mindlessly through your phone. With Excalibur napping with you, you wouldn't feel so guilty about not spending time with him during his brief reprieve between operatives.
He led you through the doorway into the room with the mattress. A soft gasp left you.
This wasn't a bed; it was a nest. The mattress was plush - the sort where just looking at it made you relax - covered with a weighted blanket, as Excalibur had promised, in addition to a heap of other blankets, and fluffy pillows. In the center of the bed were three plushies: an Excalibur in miniature, an orange Kubrow, and a Infested Kavat.
"Oh, Excalibur, you didn't have to do that," you said, clambering up onto the bed to snuggle the plushies close. They were velveteen soft, and mindlessly adorable. "I love them."
He laughed as he climbed in bed after you, sliding his hands around your waist and pulling you higher up on the bed, to the pillows. "I thought they might help you sleep better. This one," he poked the Excalibur plushie, "is supposed to function as a dream catcher. It will protect you from bad dreams."
You nuzzled closer against your boyfriend, slinging a leg over his. "Very practical," you said. Although you didn't have nightmares often, the content of your dreams often disturbed you, though they weren't enough to scare you, they were the sort that you would force yourself to wake up from to escape. You hadn't considered the use of a dreamcatcher before.
"And what about the other two?" You stretched upward to kiss Excalibur's inner arm, where it was wrapped around you. He hummed in contentment, and pressed a kiss to your forehead.
"Kavat is supposed to help you reach your desired reality in dreams. Like a guide."
The Kavat plushie was spindly and long, punctuated with pink and twists of blue.
You'd always loved cats, and considered yourself as more of a cat person than a dog person, though you adored both. You and Excalibur had been working on obtaining a Kavat recently, having decided to expand your little family. They were even more elusive and difficult to obtain than Kubrow. But you hoped soon to have one to add to your household. It would add an even greater sense of completion.
"And the Kubrow?"
Excalibur shrugged and folded himself over you, his face tucked against the crook of your neck. His breath was hot against your skin, slowing as he descended toward sleep. One of the benefits of Tenno was he could make himself fall asleep whenever he wanted, and could accelerate the sleeping advantages so, for him, a calculated hour long nap, like you were attempting now, would be as refreshing to him as a nine hour rest. It was advantages like that which made you wish you were a Tenno. You couldn't remember the last time you'd felt truly rested.
"They're just cute. Cute things give you serotonin," he explained sleepily. "Do you have a favorite?"
"Sure I do. You, silly." You kissed his neck. He smiled against your skin, arms tightening around you.
"Okay, Ordis, can you please give us some ASMR for sleep and relaxation?" Excalibur asked.
"Do you have a preference for what kind?"
Excalibur pressed lazy kisses across your clavicle. "You choose, babe. Whatever you think will help you sleep."
It had been a long time since you'd listened to ASMR. You told Ordis to play your old favorite - an apothecary ambience.
At the first notes of the bubbling water, your shoulders released their tension, and you sank more deeply into the mattress. It framed your body, supporting every curve and limb in a way that your usual mattress didn't. With Excalibur wrapped around you, too, it was everything you could have asked for. That he took the time and effort to do this for you - that he cared about your sleep schedule and wanted to make sure you were getting rest, warmed you from the top of your head down to your toes. It was Excalibur's love language, after all. Acts of love. Knowing just what to do to soothe you.
Eyes closed, you listened to the apothecary ambience and slowly tried to meditate, to open your mind to sleep. It was one of the things constantly being suggested to combat not only your anxiety, but insomnia as well. To empty yourself and not think, not worry, not stress, but to lose yourself to the quiet, to the peace. To let it serenade you and bring you to that safe space of rest.
And somehow, in the serene security Excalibur and Ordis had created, your found your body growing heavy. Your mind turned pliant and void, trailing toward that sweet abyss until you fell asleep against him, lost in his heartbeat and the sound of his breathing, and the softness of the plushies for love and protection bundled between your bodies.