Disclaimer: I do not own Magi

Warnings: violent thoughts, self-harm, suggested mental illness, spoilers for Adventures of Sinbad

AN: I've been reading Adventures of Sinbad, and it turns out little Ja'far was one sick puppy before Sinbad came along. It would make sense that, even though he grew up all nice and normal, he would still be traumatized by his childhood. So I did some research into PTSD, added in my own experience with anxiety disorders, and made this lovely, depressing fic.

Scars of the Past

Ja'far liked to think that he had left his past behind when he had decided to travel with Sinbad. However, no matter how skilled he was at lying, he was never all that good at lying to himself. No amount of denial could allow him to forget the blood that stained his hands even a decade and a half after he had left that life for a better one. Underneath his facade of manners and polite smiles, he continued to be the ruthless assassin who had murdered dozens of people at an age when most children were still afraid the dark.

Sometimes Ja'far managed to forget his origins. He buried himself in the role of general and advisor, working until nothing but the mind-numbing bureaucracy of keeping a kingdom running stuck in his head. Those moments when he became so thoroughly and completely lost in his work that he could barely even recall his own name were a respite that he gladly accepted. However, the smallest things were able to break through the walls he put up around the less savory aspects of himself. On a bad day, the mere sight of something as simple as the color red could trigger a flood of dangerous thoughts that enjoyed anything that reminded him of the blood he had spilt. No matter how he fought such intrusive thoughts, he could never win. They seemed to feed off his fear of them, growing stronger and more malicious until he was forced to make excuses and flee to somewhere quiet to collect himself.

Ja'far knew that he was not going to have a pleasant day when he walked in on Sharrkan and Yamraiha arguing and almost immediately had to fight the urge to slit their throats so they would shut the hell up. They stopped bickering as soon as he came in, likely embarrassed that someone was witnessing yet another one of their petty squabbles, but it didn't matter. The idea was stuck in his mind now and it didn't intend on leaving anytime soon. Ja'far frowned at the two of them and automatically began lecturing them on the importance of proper conduct befitting people of their station while violent images and plans swirled through his head. He tried to stop them, but he couldn't help thinking that he would have to take Yamraiha out first before she had the chance to cast a spell and it would have to be quick so he would probably just slice open her carotid artery and move on to Sharrkan while he was distracted by her death and-

Ja'far dug his fingernails into his palms, letting the stabs of pain derail his train of thought. Yamraiha and Sharrkan looked suitably chastised, so it was best that he leave before his bloodthirsty brain took its ideas any further. He turned towards the door, but was blocked by a huge, familiar figure.

"Lecturing the children again, Ja'far?" Hinahoho laughed. He smiled back weakly, taking in the large man who would defeat him in a straight fight but Ja'far had a weapon suitable for fighting at a distance so he could stay just out of arm's reach and cut away at Hinahoho until he lost enough blood that he-

Hinahoho grinned and patted him on the back, practically knocking the wind out of him. Ja'far had to forcibly restrain himself from retaliating, from hurting the man who was hurting him even though this wasn't an attacker, this was his friend and he couldn't just grab the hand resting on his shoulder and slash a blade across the exposed veins in his wrist and-

"Er, are you okay?" Hinahoho asked, snapping Ja'far back into reality.

"I'm fine," he replied, nails still digging into his hands. He didn't know what was wrong with him. Most of the time he could handle himself and keep his awful thoughts at bay, but today he just couldn't. He had been under a lot of stress lately though, what with the threat of the Kou empire and everything. However, knowing the reason behind it didn't help with the result.

Suddenly, Ja'far felt something hot and wet spreading across his fingers. At first he wrote it off as sweat, just his nerves acting up, but then the pain hit him. Somehow he had managed to cut open his own palms without noticing. Blood was on his hands, a familiar feeling though it wasn't usually his own.

Sharrkan said something to him, but he couldn't quite hear it. His focus narrowed to the warm, sticky fluid wetting his hands that was bringing back the memories that he had tried so hard to seal away. He shouldn't be able to remember so vividly, it had been so long ago and he had been so very young, but the images filled his head like a hall of portraits all staring at him with their dead eyes. Fulvius the Reiman diplomat that had probably been a spy, Leila the prostitute who tried to blackmail some political bigwig, Najib the merchant that cheated the crown out of their share, and those were just the ones that stood out from the crowd of corpses that haunted him. So many more were nameless strangers that he had been told to kill, and he had just done it, no questions asked. All of Ja'far's victims flashed before his eyes, their faces white and their throats cut and their eyes still looking at him and accusing him and asking why he had killed them and-

Someone grabbed at Ja'far, holding him by the shoulders and shaking him, talking to him, but he couldn't focus enough to listen. Everything seemed blurry and bloody and he didn't quite understand what was going on. Large arms wrapped around him, prompting him to start struggling because he was probably being pulled into a chokehold, but it never came. Those arms that could have easily snapped him in half like a toothpick seemed content to hold him gently, like he was a child again. Ja'far leaned against the solid chest he was being pressed against, taking a moment to regulate his breathing and realizing that he had nearly passed out from hyperventilating. He decided that this was a nice place to rest, if only for a moment.