Breathe

Joyce Knightly: February 23rd,20XX

Aaron held me in a hug and tried his best to wait while I calmed down, but it was difficult. It wasn’t like Destia was super badly hurt or anything, and they said that she’d be up on her feet and back to normal in under a week.

But still.

On her first day of meeting with the scientists?

And it had to happen on the same day that Eva had used her powers. Aaron didn’t even know about that yet, and then the twins were fighting and it looked like I’d dug up some trauma in Archer before and-

“Joyce, you need to calm down and breathe. I’m here if you want to talk… well, I’m here even if you don’t want to talk. But you need to calm down before we do anything. You aren’t on your own, but I can’t help unless I know what’s happening. So calm down and when you’re ready, I’ll still be here to listen.”

I could hear how shaken he was from the way his voice trembled, but I could also hear his efforts to sound calm.