/A/N: Hi guys. So I'm working on some Christmas FFXII fics but this has been burning in my mind for the longest time. I did write another fic but for reasons that don't concern any of you I pulled it off. Sorry, but kinda sorta not. Anyhow, to the point of this fic. I felt oddly compelled to write about the effects on the human mind that solitude can have. I hope you enjoy. Special thanks to Adam Conover's Adam Ruins Everything for providing extra facts on the topic.
Vaan had readjusted himself in his shirt at least a dozen times. He wasn't sure if he was uncomfortable with the situation or with the shirt itself. The room was small, cold, and dark; it was only about the size of a king-sized bed in length and diameter, and had a draft that, coupled with the darkness and dampness around him, was as frozen as Nordic hell. He had tried multiple times to find enough room to put his arms around himself inside the shirt in a feeble attempt to keep himself warm, but it hadn't been enough to do anything. So he spent much of his time shivering, trying to find a way to keep his core body temperature up, hating the shirt that had been thin and tailored to his size so as to not be big enough to hide weapons in.
How had this happened in the first place? He didn't know how it had even started, but he remembered where it had started for himself. Vaan had been caught for such a simple crime; had Balthier been there, he would've probably gotten away with the petty theft. But nonetheless, he had been caught and dragged off to God-knows-where prison. He had refused to eat the entire time he was there: his time would be much better spent devising a way to escape. However, he had earned enough infractions from refusing to eat (surprisingly it only took three infractions on the first day he was there) and they had put him in solitary confinement, the wing of the prison where prisoners were held in tiny caged rooms like animals. And apparently, contrary to popular belief, all it took to get there was being someone the guards didn't want to deal with.
He supposed maybe he had it coming, though it seemed like a very harsh punishment for something so very stupid.
Vaan lied on his side, curled into a fetal position, trying to get some sleep. He found that it wasn't working, with the cold drips of water landing on the back of his neck, and the draft coming through making the spot on his neck that much colder. He closed his eyes and tried to ignore it; he knew he would be able to ignore it eventually, but right now it wasn't working. He opened his eyes and jumped at the sight, looking up from his small wooden bed to see a figure standing above him.
"Vaan, I've come to get you."
Vaan squinted and blinked the sleep from his eyes, and the figure came into focus. "Balthier?"
"I'm here now," he knelt by the young blonde and put his hand on his head, feeling the sandy blonde locks gently. "Are you okay?"
He nodded and sat up, looking at Balthier and then the door, the one that had confined him for so long, closed but waiting to be opened. He stood up and looked out the tiny window of the door. He saw the others waiting just outside for the two. "So there's this, but how are we gonna—" He turned back just to see that Balthier was gone. And with another swift turn, he peered back outside the window and saw that the others were gone as well. He felt his breath deepen and quicken simultaneously. They were never there. Another hallucination.
Yes, he hadn't just become alone. He was always alone there. He found that the longer he had stayed there, the more his wishes had become delusions, lucid dreams that he was awake for. And every time, he fell for it, hoping against hope that maybe this time, he wouldn't just be seeing things; no matter how terrible it was, there was a chance to escape with every incident. But it had felt so real every time, it would be hard to tell.
He supposed this wasn't entirely the worse illusion he had encountered. There was one he had felt… when was it? How much time had passed? Hours? Days? Maybe even weeks or months by now. He couldn't tell anymore. But there was one he had felt, the first one in fact, that consisted of Vayne himself dominating the younger male. He had bent the blonde over and forced himself on the other in the worst way possible. It left him in tears, and when Vayne was suddenly gone, it left him confused and reeling. His clothes had been left on, and when he had slipped his hand down the back of his pants, he hadn't felt any tears or blood like he'd thought there would be. And that was when the hallucinations had started. Consequently, that was also when the panic attacks and paranoia had started. And he'd been dealing with them ever since.
He lied back down on his back and gave up on keeping warm, and he felt a stream of hot tears start spilling down his cheeks. Perhaps this one was the worst vision he had. His lover had been right in front of his face, and then yanked away in a cruel joke his mind was playing on him. Being alone 23 hours a day (except one hour where he had been put in another lonely room and force-fed) had put a strain on his mental health. He was definitely in worse mental shape than he was when he first showed up at that prison.
A week and a half into solitary life, Vaan stopped fighting it. The hallucinations were often and quite deafeningly silent but loud. He had grown accustomed to it and lost his urge to move whenever ghostly Balthier would try to coax him up. Even when he had felt himself being shaken awake, lifted into the older man's arms and rushed out of that room of horrors. He didn't let himself believe it until he had been taken outside of the building, the man holding onto him running off a short distance to where the Strahl had been hidden. Fran and Basch had been fighting the guards off of them, Penelo and Ashe ready to get the Strahl air-born as soon as everyone was back, but all of Vaan's attention was on the brunette pirate. He had obviously been putting an enormous strain on himself to be running as fast as he was, carrying as much as he was as carefully as possible. He saw sweat bead up on his cheek and roll off down his chin. One droplet had hit Vaan's nose, and he knew. That was all the proof he needed.
His breath quickened and deepened again. Another panic attack was welling up inside of him. Of course this was to be expected; having lived in absolute isolation for so long had made the outside world seem so unbearable. Tears had gushed from his eyes, and with that, he let out a loud, piercing scream.
This alarmed Balthier to the point where he had tripped and fell, holding tightly to Vaan and throwing himself underneath the other to keep the young blonde from getting hurt. "Vaan!" The blonde had rolled off of Balthier and fell face-down ass-up in the dirt right next to the sky pirate. Balthier got up and, without dusting himself off, grabbed Vaan and pulled him up into his arms once again. "You need to calm down." He nestled his face into the dirt-dusted blonde hair and stood there a minute as Vaan let out several loud cries. He had hoped that by staying still and just holding him steadily would calm him a little, and after a minute or so, loud wails turned into soft whimpers. "Come on, we need to get out of here." He whispered in the younger male's ear and started walking in the direction of the Strahl, slowly turning it into a run so as to not alarm Vaan.
Fran and Basch weren't that far behind; they had witnessed the incident with Vaan and Balthier, and Basch felt a bit of his heart rip. He knew what Vaan was going through, having been in solitary himself not very long ago. Only Vaan hadn't developed the skill to differentiate reality from insanity, and this hurt him deeply. Vaan's mind had become a ticking time bomb he couldn't control, and Basch knew it was pure torture. Deep inside, he was glad that Vaan had people who cared enough about him to come to his aid, and to try and comfort him back into his usual self. He would've killed to have someone rescue him like that.
Fran, however, being the solitary creature she was, didn't quite understand why Vaan had acted out the way he did. She knew humes were social creatures, but she was blissfully unaware of the true consequences loneliness had on a hume's mind.
Vaan held on tightly to Balthier; now that he knew he was really there, he didn't want to risk having him disappear on him.
Once aboard the Strahl, Ashe and Penelo worked together to get her up in the air. It was sort of cute, actually. Ashe and Penelo never really got to do anything together, but they both seemed really happy afterwards. As soon as Balthier set the younger male down, Vaan had most of Penelo's attention.
"Oh I'm so glad you're okay!" she pulled him into a tight hug that made Vaan freeze up. "I was so terrified when I couldn't find you. It took a lot to find someone who actually knew where you went!" It was a good thing Balthier had been holding onto him still, otherwise he might have fell over from utter shock.
Basch sensed this and nudged the young blonde woman away. "Don't, Penelo, he's scared right now. That will not help him recover."
She thought it was weird that he understood, but didn't question it.
Then Basch motioned for Balthier to lend him his ear. Balthier obliged.
"Take him to his room and keep an eye on him, okay? I'm not sure he can handle more than one person right now," he whispered, and both men looked down at the blonde boy, who had been pressing himself against Balthier and watching the women and Basch with paranoid blue eyes. "I'll let the others know what's going on."
Balthier nodded in agreement, then led Vaan away from the others, down towards his room.
Penelo looked almost distraught. "What's wrong with him?"
"My guess would be he's suffering from delirium caused by being in isolation too long…" Basch shrugged with a disheartened look. "It causes a bunch of problems that can affect one's mental health."
Fran nodded as she listened to his words. Being the team's foremost medic, she thought it important to know this information.
"Is there anything we can do to make him better?" Penelo had hope. He admired that about her.
"Afraid not. What we have to do is slowly reintroduce him to society and hope for the best." Basch sighed. "I'm sure he'll be okay, but… it'll take time."
Balthier had taken Vaan to his own room instead. His room felt a lot more comfortable and home-like than Vaan's did, and he figured that would help relax him a little. It didn't.
"Balthier?" Vaan said quietly, still pressed against Balthier but now they were both on the edge of the bed. He felt himself on the edge of a panic attack as well.
"Yes?"
"You're… Balthier, aren't you?"
Balthier kind of quirked an eyebrow at such a question, but he figured Vaan just wanted some reassurance. "Yes, who else would I be?"
"Sorry. You probably aren't here, huh?"
This confused Balthier even more. "I am here, though. You can't tell?"
Vaan shook his head. "I can't tell much anymore. You would be with me one minute and gone the next, and then I realize you were never with me and that I had just imagined it."
Balthier frowned. He and Vaan had been in love for a long time now, and something about these phantasms Vaan had seen made him feel sick. There was no doubt that he felt guilty for not finding him sooner, but this hurt him just a little more.
"Maybe I'm just dreaming. Maybe it's all just a dream. Maybe it was just that… well, I wanted Balthier to save me so badly, that even now I'm imagining how it would play out." Vaan lied against him in a dreary state, as if he wanted to sleep but couldn't bring himself to do so. "You'd take me to your room," he said softly, thinking that he was hallucinating again about what he thought the elder's room would look like, "and never let me go."
Balthier was lost for a response. Vaan would've probably never told him something like this; he probably only spoke of it because he thought he wasn't really there. "… Would you like that?"
The blonde boy nodded gently. "Yeah, a lot actually."
Again the brunette felt lost. Then he put his arms around Vaan carefully and gave him a reassuring squeeze. "I promise you this is real. I'm not disappearing on you and I'm certainly not leaving you alone any time soon."
"Yeah," Vaan nestled closely to the other, "sure you are."
"I'm serious right now," he moved and Vaan sat himself up. It was just now that Balthier was able to get a better look at him. He was disheveled; his hair was a mess and the clothes he had on were a joke. "Lie down for a moment would you?" He stood up and walked to the dresser adjacent to the bed, opening one of the drawers and pulled out a pair of scissors. "We need to get those clothes off of you."
Vaan complied but said nothing. Yes, the clothes he had been wearing were tight, but he didn't even notice it anymore. He always had bigger problems to deal with.
Balthier moved back to the bed and grabbed the fabric of the younger male's shirt between two fingers, carefully cutting the torso and sleeves of the shirt until it lay beneath Vaan as a piece of scrap material. From there he proceeded to cut the pants off of the boy, and, upon realizing the younger wasn't wearing undergarments, quickly turned his head away.
"I-I'm sorry for looking," he said, even though it wouldn't be the first or the last time he'd see Vaan's naked form.
"It's okay," Vaan sat up and held himself. He was still very cold.
Balthier got up, once again going to the dresser and this time he pulled out a thick blood-red robe. It was probably the warmest thing he owned, and he felt the other's skin enough to know the boy would need it. He threw it over Vaan's shoulders and wrapped him in it tightly, and then sat down and just held him.
Since Vaan felt like he could share his feelings, Balthier wanted to as well. "I just want to hold you like this forever. I promise I'm here right now. I know you're tired and I know you don't want to go to bed for fear that when you wake I won't be here. I can tell. I can see it in your eyes. Just get some rest and I'll be here when you wake up tomorrow."
Vaan said nothing for a long while, but eventually spoke. "How can I know for sure?" he whispered. "How can I trust you?"
"Trust me because I ask you to, love. Tomorrow morning you will be in this bed, wearing my robe under the covers, in my arms. And I'll smile knowing that you're back where you belong, and I'll never let you go again."
The next morning, Vaan blinked the sleep from his eyes and found it hard to move. His arms were loosely locked down at his sides, and the heat was almost smothering. The scent of the man lying next to him had a familiar, comforting effect, and when he looked to his sides he saw a set of arms that had been strong, but not too muscly. And for a minute he felt that he was just imagining what he wanted so desperately to be real. But when he looked up and saw the slumbering face of a soft-hearted sky pirate, he knew that things were going to be better.
/Yeah, I know. I was stuck for an ending. Sue me. I might follow it up with something else but I highly doubt I will. Just deal with this for now, lemme know if there's anything I can fix on it. Later peeps.