Eli might not be Thrawn, but he can still read people. Even if he couldn’t, he’s pretty sure he’d notice the way Thrawn’s started backing himself into corners and chewing the inside of his lip, tapping his fingers against his thumb in that staccato one-two-three-four-three-two-one pattern. He’s been overwhelmed all night, but now he’s reaching his limit.
Across the room, Yularen’s staring at them. No, not them, Eli realizes. Just Thrawn. He glances to the side and notices the problem.
“Hey,” Eli whispers, leaning against the table behind them and pretending to reach for a drink. “You’re rocking.”
Thrawn sucks in a sharp breath, coming to a stop immediately. Bright eyes find Eli’s hands, then his chin, and Thrawn clears his throat. “I apologize, Ensign.”
Eli sighs, taking a drink. It’s bitter, far too alcoholic for his tastes. “Don’t be. Just, Yularen was staring. That’s all.”
Thrawn nods jerkily. Eli looks across the room again. Yularen is busy talking with a Senator.
The limit comes maybe half an hour later, when Eli and Thrawn turn away from some inane conversation and the tension suddenly drops out of Thrawn’s shoulders. He stops tapping his fingers together and he leans a little to the left, drifting closer to Eli. Eli looks up and, sure enough, his eyes are wide and glazed over, his mouth slack.
“Sir?” he tries.
Slowly, Thrawn’s head turns. “Ensign,” he whispers.
“Okay, time to go,” Eli decides. They reach the wall and Eli deposits Thrawn there, standing between him and the crowd. “I’m going to make our excuses and then we’ll leave.”
Thrawn nods, listless.
Eli makes his rounds as fast as he can. Still, by the time they reach the parking garage, he’s guiding Thrawn by the wrist, urging him forward and reminding him which vehicle is theirs. Their driver, thank the Gods, was quick to respond to Eli’s message and is already waiting with the engine on. Thrawn needs a bit of prompting to get in, but he manages to buckle his seatbelt in the time it takes Eli to get around to the other side.
“To the Academy,” he tells the driver.
“Of course, sirs. Are you…?”
“We’re fine, thanks,” Eli snaps. “Take us back to the Academy.”
Eli sets a glass of water on the floor next to Thrawn’s bunk.
“Thank you, Eli.”
Eli startles at the answer, mumbled from beneath Thrawn’s ridiculously heavy weighted blanket. All Eli can see of him is a tuft of dark hair and a pair of socked feet.
“Yeah, of course. Anything else I can do?”
The blanket shifts and the tuft of hair materializes into a bleary blue face, blinking at Eli in the dim light. “No, thank you. You have already helped more than I could have asked for.”
His voice is still soft, halting, and his eyes focus somewhere around Eli’s chin. It hasn’t quite been an hour since they left the party, and Eli knows Thrawn needs more rest. He’s going to sleep like the dead tonight.
“Can I touch you?” Eli asks, stepping up to the edge of the bed.
Thrawn shrugs, but tips his head forward in invitation. Eli meets him halfway, letting him rest his forehead against his chest and wrap his arms around his waist. Eli rests his hands on Thrawn’s head, careful not to touch too lightly or dig his fingers into his hair.
Thrawn purrs, halting and soft. He’s careful not to lean closer and Eli is careful not to push. Everything feels like being crushed when I’m like this, Thrawn had told him once before. Eli wants to hold him, wants to comfort him like Thrawn comforts him when he’s upset, but he knows that it wouldn’t be the same to Thrawn. Things that helped Eli could hurt him, and Eli would take the aching wanting in his chest over the sight of Thrawn trying to stave off a meltdown any day.
He’s still working on getting Thrawn to see his shutdowns as similar to his meltdowns. Too often, he tries to brush them off, and if Eli had to guess, he’d say that someone had spent a lot of time praising little Thrawn for shoving all of his pain down into nothingness. If no one else sees it, it’s not real. It’s not a problem.
It’s exhausting, though, and Eli never wants to go back to their early Academy days when Thrawn was always hanging by a thread, snapping at anything that got too close. Things haven’t gotten that bad in a long time. Even though Eli’s sure Thrawn thinks he’s being dramatic, he’s at least willing to play along with the post-shutdown routine Eli’s established. He’s willing to lie down and rest if Eli thinks it’s important.