Heart is pretty sure that he is going to die.
He moves barely an inch, and yet the chains hold him back. With a wavering sigh, he lets his head fall again.
He can hear magic spells and pounding outside his room, but every time the monster in the halls kills something, his hope wanes further. The noises will probably go away soon. He prefers the silence. That way, he can sleep.
A shriek of pain.
The clone.
Heart feels bad for it. It's trying to survive, too, and the only way it knows how is to be aggressive. He wonders how strong the creature fighting him is, as he very rarely hears it cry out.
But then he hears a different scream of agony, and the voice is too familiar for him to bear. Time seems to pause while Heart's eyes widen and water with a tiny gasp. He is unable to think for a few seconds.
A cry of anguish rips out of his mouth, and he lunges forwards only to be restrained once more by the chains. Something is eating away at his chest. An ache worse than anything else, feeling so toxic but at the same time, wonderful.
It burns.
So with a frustrated shout, he angrily flails around in an attempt to break the links. However, it only serves to tire him out and further bruise himself. He stops to struggle and tries to catch his jittering breaths.
He notices that the lab is silent.
What happened? Is his brother ok? Or is the clone triumphantly siphoning his energy while covering his mouth?
Heart swallows what little saliva is still in his mouth. His jaw hangs loose while he takes shaking breaths.
No.
He can't be dead.
Heart stares blankly at the door and sniffles. His shoulders bounce slightly as he quietly shivers, though he has grown used to the coldness of the floor long ago. He's gotten used to the literal empty feeling in his stomach, the head-splitting migraines, that gradual drip of water in the corner.
The dreams.
But not Soul. NotSoulnotSoulnotS
oulnotSoulnotSoulnotSouldon'tdieSoulpleasenotSoulnotSoulnotSoulpleasepleasepleasenotSoulnotSoulno-
A gloved hand rests on Heart's shoulder.
"Heart?"
He could have jumped up and hit the ceiling with how shocked he was to see Soul's pained grey eyes staring into him, analyzing him. Quickly figuring out the best thing to do. He finds himself leaning his head on Soul's hand. The touch is so much warmer than Heart that if he was able to move at this moment, he would be nestled into his brother. Just the promise of warmth on its own is enough to make him yearn for an embrace.
"I'm going to shatter the links of your chains, ok? So please don't be afraid. I will not hurt you, I promise," Soul says quietly as he tilts his hand. He slowly pulls his hand away, brushing Heart's sunken cheek in the process. He stands up and runs over to his swords and carries them back. He puts one down and uses his free hand to hold Heart's arm. This confuses Heart, since he can barely move it anyways, along with why Soul's swords were by the door. Had he dropped them?
The spirit of sorrow connects the blade to the second-to-last link with a clink. After a couple seconds, he raises his arm and swings.
The metal shatters, and Heart flinches as a few shards hit his body, but don't pierce skin. Soul gradually lowers Heart's arm until it is completely lowered, and he flexes his fingers. He now understands the reason Soul had supported his arm.
Soul repeats this with his other arm, by which point Heart has managed to stretch the cramped muscles in his left arm. The wrist bands on him still constrict him uncomfortably, but at least he is free to move his arms. Heart continues to watch as his brother hack through the remaining links on his legs.
Soul exhales and allows his arms to fall when he is finished.
Very slowly, Heart stretches out his legs until they are flat, all the while hissing from the pain. When he is finished, he looks up to Soul. His brother slowly kneels down by his side.
Soul slowly slides the bag on his back off, unzips it, and starts digging his hand into it. He pulls out a small canteen, and Heart's eyes bulge out of their sockets. No words need to be exchanged; Soul immediately forks it over, and Heart twists the cap off.
"Uh... Heart?" Heart eyes Soul with surprising innocence. The brother pauses, and he seems to struggle to move his mouth. "Drink as much as you need." He finally says with a softened face. Heart takes to chugging down the water right away, but it only takes a couple seconds before he puts the canteen down and coughs forcefully.
He feels a hand on his shoulder as he catches his breath, along with blood oozing into his mouth. He runs his tongue over his lips and finds they are chapped to the point where simply curling them around the neck of the canteen causes them to bleed. His body aching, he twists the cap onto the canteen and hands it back to Soul. The hand leaves his back as Soul stores the canteen and stands.
"Are you ready, Heart?" He asks quietly. Heart nods briskly and pushes himself up onto knees. Cautiously, he starts to stand up, noting Soul being prepared to help him up. But he manages to stand on his own two feet by himself.
He looks to his brother expectantly, waiting to follow. Soul stares back, his straight expression looking a bit more down then what Heart remembers since they last saw each other.
The spirit of sorrow places the bag that was on his back on the ground, then sucks both arms into their sleeves and begins to slide the robe over his head.
"Soul?" A baffled Heart rasps.
"Wear it," is the only response he gets after a couple of seconds. By this point, a nude Soul is holding the robe by its shoulders. "Until we find yours."
Heart is about to refuse, but the slight choke in Soul's voice makes him reconsider. Hesitantly, he takes the robe and wriggles inside it. When his head pops back out through the hood, he sees Soul pick up their bag on the floor.
"Is Dockery in there?" Heart asks in a small voice while soaking in the leftover body heat from Soul. Said spirit looks up from the bag and eyes him. It occurs to Heart that he may have spoken too softly, but he is afraid to repeat himself in case that look of confusion is meant to mock him.
"Did you say something, Heart?" Soul questions with sincerity. Heart initially doesn't reply, but eventually nods. "So, could you repeat what you said, please?"
"I said, could I see Dockery?" He repeats louder, his voice hoarse from overuse after being quiet for so long. Though he has had some water, his throat is drier than the Prickly Desert. Soul grunts in response and unzips the bag.
"Heart! My, how I've missed you!" Is the alarm clock's immediate reaction. He leaps out of the bag and bounces up to Heart. "What happened to you?!"
The little smile that had formed on his face upon seeing the clock has now frozen. Despite this, Heart kneels down and embraces the clock as tightly as he can, which isn't all that much. Nonetheless, Dockery still squirms a bit, so he grudgingly lets go and wipes his eyes. He glances at Soul again, who raises his eyelids in acknowledgement. The clock, needing no command, bounces back into the bag, and Soul zips it back up and slings it over his shoulder.
Heart staggers up to his feet and wraps his arms around his midsection. He gulps down a sob, thankful that he doesn't need to describe what happened to him. He knows he'll have to spill eventually, but he'd rather not think about it now. He'd rather be happy.
Fake it 'till you make it, right?
Soul outstretches his hand to
Heart, who latches on wordlessly.
"Ready?"
Heart bobs his head silently.
"Alright, Heart. Time to go find your things. You don't know where they are, do you?"
He shakes his head.
"Let's hope they haven't been incinerated yet," Soul remarks, and he begins to walk forwards. Heart follows, unwilling to have to be physically dragged along.
The corridors are dark other than a couple of weak blue lights.
"Can I..." He trails off at Soul's look, so rather than finishing his question he grabs his arm with both hands. His body stops being as tense from pressing up against his brother. "I want to sleep." He mumbles quietly.
"Me too, Heart. When we leave, you can fall asleep in the truck, if you would like to," Soul responds, and Heart jumps in surprise. He hadn't realized that Soul would be able to hear, but he nods anyway.
The darkness no longer causing him as much fear, he walks side-by-side with his brother into a room with double doors.
It appears to be a storage room, with the hundreds of cabinets and drawers and whatnot. Soul groans beside him. "Really?" He asks the empty room. Heart slowly lets go of his arm as Soul turns to face him. "Do you want to split up to see what we find?" His brother asks. He immediately shakes his head no, and shifts slightly closer, but no longer latching on. It's a storage room, and in movies hiding in storage rooms can be safe. Or scary AND safe. But he's with Soul, so it's ok.
They walk past large crates and jars filled with all sorts of things. He is somewhat intrigued, but he is unsettled by the animals and plants in said jars. What happened to them? Are they dead? They look pretty dead to him, but they could just be sleeping or something. Just slee-
His eyes catch two words on the label of a jar filled with dimly-glowing yellow liquid.
Spirit blood.
He sucks in a breath as his gaze fixes on the jar. That blood had to be his; he was the only spirit who was here. The inside of his thighs and elbows begin to throb from the memory. He remembered them taking blood from him, but enough to fill a jar bigger than his head?
His stomach churns from what he is attempting to forget resurfacing. He starts to feel sweat crawling down his head and back, and he shivers. His eyes shut on their own, but that's not enough because the fear and sickness are still there and he doesn't-
"Heart!" He hears as two hands grab his shoulders and twist his body away. His eyes open again to take in the appearance of Soul. "Heart, I have called your name five times and you still wouldn't react at all. What's wrong?"
Heart is unsure whether or not he is actually going to throw up, but he definitely doesn't need to get gross stuff all over his brother. His face twists as he pushes Soul's arms off and kneels next to a crate. He pulls down the hoodie he is wearing as he starts gagging.
A hand places itself on his lower back, and it goes up and down, up and down. The urge to vomit slowly lessens to a dull ache in his stomach. His rapidly-beating heart begins to slow down, and his breathing evens out. He pushes himself up so he is sitting on his knees, gradually winding down again from his burst of fear.
"Heart?" He hears his name again, and he turns his head to face Soul, who is still patting his back. "What was it you were looking at?" Heart pauses, then raises his arm and points directly at the jar. A worried Soul follows his gaze. He squints, even though he has perfect vision, then gets up and walks over to it.
An eternity passes by, and then Soul pulls the jar off of the shelf. He sets it down, and as soon as Heart realizes what Soul is going to grab he squeezes his eyes shut and plugs his ears so that he can't see or hear the number of jars there will be on the floor because he doesn't want to know how many jars are filled up with his blood and tears because yes they actually stuck a needle in one of his tears and sucked it up while driving long pieces of metal into his limbs then pulling them out and watching him desperately push his healing powers to the limit and it was even harder when he couldn't move and had to focus on healing his wounds but there was something on the tips of the metal pieces that hurt really really badly and it made him want to throw up because he was crying so hard he couldn't breathe and they didn't care because he didn't have to breathe but everything was on fire and lightning was shooting up to his head and he was screaming and there was blood everywhere and there was a windy...
Whooshing?
He opens his eyes to find he is faced away from the jars. He is also in Soul's gentle but sturdy hug, swaying back and forth. There's something soft in his ears sending chills down his back, but it's also helping him feel calm. His eyelids slowly shut as he returns the embrace. What's that sound, though? He listens more carefully now.
It's a song. It's a song that sounds sad and happy at the same time. It's soft. It's a lullaby. And it's making him very sleepy. A grin starts to show up on his face as he relaxes. His cheeks are still a little wet, and his throat feels cut up, but that's ok.
He feels the rocking stop. When Soul pulls away he whines softly, but with a happier heart. He opens his eyes and finds himself staring at Soul's face. "I wanna sleeeeeep," Heart slurs, his head lolling to the side just like those weird looking puppies he'd pick up and giggle over before Soul would pull him away from the store.
"After we find your things, you can sleep," Soul replies, to which Heart grumbles to in response, but with a smile. "Do you think you can handle walking out of this aisle on your own?"
Heart nods, and Soul lets go of his sides. The two stand up together.
They walk out, with Heart staring straight ahead so he doesn't see those jars. They go onto the next aisle, and start shifting through the items. It's just normal science stuff so far, like beakers, rubber hoses and those disk things on three legs you burn stuff over. They move onto the next aisle after they spare each other a glance, and freeze.
Heart did not expect an armory. But he remembers that his staff is, in fact, a weapon. His face brightens. "Hey Soul, maybe my clothes and staff are here!" He says with excitement.
"If that's the case, then let's start to look," Soul replies, and they begin to search once more. Heart runs past everything while Soul takes the time to carefully shift through everything.
Heart stops at the end of the aisle in disappointment at not having found anything. He turns around, then starts walking back the way he came. His attention is devoted fully to his right side.
He stops when he sees red.
He smiles and takes it off the rack. With raised spirits, he pulls out the hangar, which he puts back on the rack, and squeals with delight.
"Heart?" He hears Soul question, and he looks up from the dusty fabric of his robe. "Oh, good, you found it." Heart nods and tucks his robe under his arm to look for his other belongings. It takes him a couple seconds to look down and see a plastic bin. He connects the dots and drags out the bin.
"Look, Soul!" Heart cries out in delight upon removing the lid. "It's all here!" He pulls out his staff and hugs it for a few seconds, and then puts that to the side before also removing his shoes, gloves, and necklace from the bin. "Well, now that we've found my things, do you want your robe back?"
Soul takes a moment to think, then shakes his head. "I'll wear yours to warm it up."
The idea of them swapping robes makes Heart grin, so he hands his over to Soul. He then takes one of his yellow gloves and goes to slide-
He stops.
The wristband and link are still in the way, not only on his wrists but on his ankles.
"Oh," Soul says. "I didn't cut those off before because I'm afraid I'll hurt you."
"It's ok, Soul. We just have to find the key, see?" He holds up his arm and points to the keyhole on the wristband.
Soul pinches the bridge of his nose. "Oh, Sun King. That thing could be anywhere," he moans. "Do you remember seeing any keys while we were looking for your stuff?"
Heart thinks for a moment. "Nope, no keys."
"Wait." Soul's eyes widen. "I think I remember seeing a key. Come on, you can put on your other stuff later." He moves quickly out of the aisle, and Heart picks up his staff and follows in fear of being left behind.
Soul stops at the entrance to the storage room and looks back at Heart.
"It's just around the corner from the hall, so it won't take long." He slowly pushes open a door and pokes his head through. After a moment, he motions for Heart and goes through.
They quietly walk through the hallway until they reach the corner. Soul pokes his head around again.
"We're good," he says, so they continue on until Soul suddenly turns and pushes open a creaky door on their right. They both brace, but nothing pops out.
Soul hurries over to a drawer, and Heart meanwhile looks around. There's a huge monitor up on the wall above Soul's head, and everywhere else are hundreds of cabinets. Heart heads over to Soul to see what he's rummaging through.
"I found it," Soul says as he pulls out a small key.
"Wow, that's really small," Heart comments. Soul raises his eyelids and holds it out. Heart takes it and sets down his staff.
He wouldn't have ever thought opening something with a key would have given him so much relief. After he gets these monstrous things off, it's one less thing he has with him to remind him of this experience. Who even invented chains in the first place? He'd toss them over his head, but he's afraid of the noise they'll make. No, even hearing them dangling makes him feel dread.
He sets the removed wristbands on top of the drawer and starts to bend down to unlock the ones on his ankles. That's when he sees a familiar word on a folder within the drawer Soul had opened.
"What's that?" He asks quietly. After a few seconds of silence, he continues to remove the bands.
"The lab files on you."
Heart puts the bands with the rest, sets the key down, and looks at Soul.
"Did you read them?" Heart asks. Soul shuts the drawer.
"Yes."
Heart doesn't know how to feel about this. "Everything?"
Soul nods with a sad look on his face. "I'm sorry I wasn't able to get here sooner."
Heart is stunned into silence when the door starts to creak.
They both turn their heads.
"Soul?" Heart whimpers fearfully.
A pair of yellow, oval eyes are floating in the doorway.
"Don't worry, Heart," Soul says quietly as he brings his blades up and crosses them.
A third yellow hole opens up in the shape of a terrifying, open-mouth grin, and suddenly it's flying towards Heart.
Heart dives for the staff on the ground as the thing crashes into the monitor just above him. He scampers away while it screams again, and he looks back to see Soul slashing away at the thing. It flies off the counter to get away and makes a stance near the door, its angry gaze on Soul.
Heart focuses on getting himself back on his feet. When he looks back up, the thing is nearly on top of Soul, who is still slashing away, slashing away, but it's still going at him, its cut-up arms crossed in front of it. Wanting to help, Heart swings his staff back and fires a bolt of electricity.
It hits its shoulder, but nothing happens. It's like it didn't even feel it.
Heart takes a step back in horror.
He's too weak to hurt it.
The thing suddenly kicks out with one of its skinny legs and hits Soul right in the stomach.
He watches Soul's eyes bulge just before its fist slams into the underside of his jaw.
Soul falls onto his back, dropping his swords in the process. Now, the thing *is* on top of him.
He has to do something.
Heart breaks into a sprint towards the two.
He brings back his staff and swings it into the thing's eye.
It screams so loudly that it makes Heart scream, too. But he bashes its face again. He'll bash as long as he needs to so that Soul can get up again.
But it closes one of its eyes and beelines out of the door.
Heart is stunned.
He actually managed to ward it off of Soul!
"Soul!" Heart exclaims. He drops his staff and rushes to his brother's side. "Soul! Soul!"
"Heart, calm down," Soul says quietly as he sits up. Grey, glowing blood streams from his nose, and one of his eyes are shut. "I'm fine."
Heart's eyes are already filled with tears, though. If he had been stronger, he could have helped Soul. He needs to fix this.
He goes to touch Soul's face, but his brother grabs his wrist.
"Heart, I know what you're thinking, so I'm going to stop you right there," Soul says. "It's fine, ok? I know that you're not good right now, and I think that was pretty brave of you to still go up to it and wack it." He wipes off some of the blood with his finger. "Save your strength. A broken nose is nothing."
Heart is pretty sure he's about to burst into tears.
Still holding onto Heart's wrist, Soul gets up, so Heart stands as well.
"I'm scared," Heart whispers.
"I know."
"You know everything, Soul."
"I wish I did," he replies. Soul lets go. "I only have rock candies for energy. If you want, you can have one in case we have to fight that thing again." Heart wipes his eyes, sniffles, and nods. His brother pulls the bag off of his back and sets it down on the ground before digging through. After a moment, he pulls out a small blue sphere. "Here."
Heart takes the rock candy and puts it in his mouth. He lets it sit for a few seconds so that he can soak up all the sugar. Sugar is good. He loves sugar. It makes him bouncy. And rock candy is loaded with sugary sweetness.
His stomach starts to hurt, and whatever happy thoughts he had quickly vanish.
The sweetness is actually making him feel queasy.
He spits the remainder of it back into his hand and stares at it. He starts to understand why Soul hates rock candy. Except Soul still eats the whole thing when he has to. He pops it back in.
His stomach is starting to hurt more and more as he sucks on it.
"Heart, Heart, spit it out," Soul suddenly says urgently, and Heart obliges. Soul outstretches his hand, and Heart forks it over with more relief than longing for more of the sugar. "How are you feeling?"
Heart gulps down the last of his sugar-flavored spit and winces. "My tummy hurts a lot."
"I figured." Soul eyes the remaining rock candy before putting it in his mouth. He looks back at Heart with a worried face. "Do you think you're going to vomit?"
Heart shrugs and rubs his stomach in hope that the pain goes away. At least he feels a bit more energized.
"Well, let's go grab your things, and run on out of here, ok?" Soul says. "Ok, Heart?"
"Ok," Heart whispers. His brother places a hand on his shoulder and squeezes before pulling away and slinging the bag over his shoulder. Heart takes this as the cue to go pick up his staff.
He gags when he sees yellow blood coating the sun on top of it.
They cautiously make their way back to the storage room, where Heart puts on the rest of his things. Speaking of wearing his things, he looks over to Soul and the red robe he is wearing, which is slightly stained with dull grey blood.
"Do you want to switch robes?" Soul asks.
"But you look good," Heart says. "It's kind of funny seeing you in my robe."
"I could say the same." Heart smiles a little at this. "Now, how about we head on out?" Heart nods wildly, and he follows Soul.
They start creeping down the dark halls, ears perked and eyes out for any yellow eyes or weird shadowy blobs. The only thing they can hear is the sound of their own footsteps, though. Clop, clop, clop, clop.
Heart speeds up so that they're side-by-side. "How big is this place?" He whispers.
"Well, there's only two floors that I know of; this one and the ground floor. But this floor was an absolute maze to navigate while I was looking for you. I've memorized the way, though," Soul replies.
They slow down and peek around a corner together. Seeing nothing but inky blackness, they continue. Heart still looks behind him, though. Just the weird dim lights. No eyes. Why are those lights on, but not the ones ahead?
A small sphere of cold magic begins to flicker at the tip of one of Soul's blades, and the hallway ahead is illuminated slightly. A little bit of light is better than nothing, though.
Like sunlight.
Heart *really* wants to see sunlight again. Speaking of, why isn't the clone leaving? Does it not like sunlight?
"Was the lab locked up when you got here?" Heart asks.
"The lab was pretty much completely sealed. It was a pain on its own to get the entrance doors open. Your door was completely sealed shut, so I froze the thing through and smashed it," Soul says.
Heart thinks for a moment. "What if the clone gets out?"
Soul stops, so he stops, too. "That would be bad," Soul says. "It might hurt people until someone puts it to rest."
"Should we try to stop it from leaving?" Heart asks. He is very frightened at the thought of having to fight it again, but even more frightened about thinking about it hurting other people. What hurts the most is that it's his own flesh and blood.
"Do you want to?"
"No," Heart quietly replies, "But we can stop it from hurting anyone else."
Soul begins to pace in a circle, and Heart keeps spinning around to follow him, since he's in the center. He knows Soul is thinking of a way to beat the clone. The light Soul is shining is glowing brighter.
"It looks and acts stupid, but it's not. It just needs time to learn. Time to observe. It knows that I know cold magic and that I use my swords as my main offense and defense. What do you know it knows?" Soul asks, still circling.
"I... have no clue. Just that I can wack it with my staff," Heart answers dizzily. Maybe he should stop spinning. Yeah. He stops spinning.
"Ok." Soul stops too. "So. I have an idea, and I'll need your help." Soul looks Heart dead in the eyes. "How strong of a fire do you think you can manage?"
Heart pauses. How in the world is he supposed to create a strong fire if his last attempt at magic was null? Is it even possible for him anymore? Well, he does he feel a bit more energetic from that rock candy. "I don't know, but I can try to make it really big and strong."
"Do you want to try and make a small flame?"
Heart opens his free hand and concentrates on it. He sees a twinkle, and a couple seconds later, a ball of orange flame poofs into existance. He closes his hand and wills it to stop.
"Alright, so to actually take it down, what I'm planning is that I'll create a wind strong enough to keep it down, and then you'll blast it with fire. We'll keep feeding it wind and fire until the resulting product is a firenado."
"How are we going to get its attention?"
"We'll make noise."
Heart is about to voice his primary concern, but he keeps his mouth shut. Soul surely knows.
"Let's go. I know where to lure it." Soul starts walking, and Heart follows.
They head in through a set of doors into a wide room. A room Heart recognizes. He looks up at the large window on one side of the room, where a few chairs are now visible on the other side. The two walk over to a wall perpendicular to the entrance.
"Heart, could you go to the window side?" Soul asks. Heart nods and walks off. When he turns around, all he sees are Soul's gray eyes in the corner and the faint outline of the door ahead of him. Heart opens his mouth in the shape of a smile. Soul opens his mouth too, and quite possibly the strangest sound Heart has ever heard comes out. He can't help but giggle a little at the dying penguin noises.
Then Soul starts scraping his blades together, and Heart's skin couldn't have been more eager to shrivel up. He hates that sound.
No yellow glowing eyes show up in the doorway, and it starts to make Heart uneasy. Wouldn't it have come by now? Should he check to make sure it isn't already in the room?
Soul stops to make noise, and a confused look shows on his face. Heart decides he might as well light up the place a little, so he points his staff up. A few bolts of electricity start to swirl around it, and he starts to gradually increase their brightness. He's afraid to push himself.
A black outline starts to appear in the slightly brighter shadows. It's moving, too, towards Soul. Wait. Are those...
... arms?
He gasps in horror and breaks into a run.
"Soul!" He screams at the top of lungs as he swings his staff back. He can see its shape now. It swivels its body and opens its ghastly yellow eyes. His copy. It brings up its hands to grab his staff.
He swings it anyway and lets it loose.
As soon as it grabs his staff, Heart pours all of his strength into the electricity built up on his staff into the thing, and it starts to scream. But it doesn't let go. Heart can already feel his burst of energy fading.
Oh dear.
Luckily for Heart, this is when Soul brings his blades down on its arms, and it's forced to let go of his staff. It shrieks in anger and lashes out at Soul, and the two start to fight for possibly the third time.
Heart drops to one knee and lets out a shaky breath. He's already spent all his energy, and Soul needs him. But how can he get more energy-
Siphon! Like the clone does!
He puts his staff down and gets back up. Since Soul is still keeping it distracted, Heart runs up to it and leaps.
He wraps his arm around it in a choke, and closes his eyes as they both fall to the ground.
It shrieks as Heart steals its energy. It rolls so that they are both on their side and reaches back to grab at his face. Heart can already feel stronger from the siphoning. What if he can drain the monster entirely?
No, he feels too full.
Heart jumps away from it and runs for his staff, and behind him he hears the thing being slammed against the wall by the earsplitting wailing of wind. Heart grabs his staff and looks to see Soul pinning it with his magic.
"Now, Heart!" Soul yells, and Heart points his staff at the thing as it screams in anger. He thinks of Soul's blue light that led their way. He thinks of how angry he was when he heard Soul being hurt.
That thing knows the door to the outside is open.
And that makes Heart mad beyond belief.
He no longer sympathizes with it.
A stream of fire so hot it's blue and white shoots out and envelops the clone.
The blue fire starts to spin with the wind. The screams are loud and piercing, but they soon stop.
Heart keeps feeding the fire until he feels his very bones shake uncontrollably, so he gives in and collapses to the ground. Stars swim around in his eyes, and his whole body is hurting. It feels like he just ran a marathon. And even though he isn't moving, he can hear his heart pounding fast enough to give him a headache. He listens closer and hears his shallow, rapid breathing. His chest hurts, hurts even more than the rest of his body.
He feels Soul drag him up and into his lap. Heart nestles his head in the crook of Soul's neck.
"We did it," Soul says quietly. Heart nods and closes his eyes. "Do you want to siphon from me? You look beat."
"Ok," Heart whispers, and he feels Soul's hand grab his.
He absorbs his brother's energy slowly and steadily. He doesn't want to hurt him. He waits until he feels good enough to walk, then pulls his hand away from Soul. He looks up at Soul worriedly, but he doesn't look tired.
"Do you think you can walk?"
Heart nods again, so Soul lets him go. It takes him a bit to stand because his body still hurts, but he manages. He picks up his staff, and Soul his blades.
"Let's go," Soul says, and he makes that tiny blue light pop up again at the tip of his blade. Heart does his best not to look over at the charred remains of his clone as they leave.
Soul leads him up a flight of stairs, which leaves Heart even more exhausted by the time they reach the top. He follows Soul through yet another hallway, and yet another corner.
Then he sees the small trickle of light underneath a set of double doors.
Heart quickens his pace past Soul and up to the doors. A smile grows on his face when he gently pushes on one of the doors, and it gives way.
As soon as he sees that sliver of blue, he barrels through the door and out into the world.
He throws himself onto the grass and curls up into a ball, clutching the blades between his fingers. His smile grows wider and wider, until his cheeks hurt with the rest of him. He can feel the sweat on his back increase as he looks around at the sky, the clouds, the trees. The birds flying overhead. Chirping. Leaves rustling. Vibrant color. The blinding sun.
He's never going in there again. He's not going to leave this ever again. And especially not Soul. Where *is* Soul?
"Hey." Heart feels a hand on his shoulder. He rolls to his other side so that he can see him.
"Hi, Soul."
"You really love the outdoors, huh."
"I missed this," Heart says softly. "And I missed you, too."
Soul sweeps him up into a tight hug. It hurts a little, in both ways, but that's ok. He soaks up the hug and sighs. He feels good now. This is the best he's felt in a while. He doesn't know if it's been days or weeks or months or even years.
He pulls away to look at Soul, since he's so happy he could probably kiss him. But Soul doesn't look happy at all!
"Soul? What's wrong?" Heart asks worriedly. "Do you want another hug?"
Soul doesn't verbally reply, but his eyes start to tear up. As Heart watches, Soul even starts to shrink.
Heart hugs him again and guides his head onto his shoulder. He was *not* expecting Soul to cry at all, but it doesn't matter now. Right now, Soul is upset and that needs to be helped.
"I'm ok, Soul. We're out of that awful place, and we can go back to saving Soma," Heart says reassuringly. "It's all ok."
Soul starts to rock them back and forth, back and forth. He starts to breathe more slowly, and his tight hold on Heart relaxes a bit. He slowly pulls away and stares at Heart with watery eyes.
"I love you, Heart," he croaks. Heart smiles at that.
"I love you too, Soul."
Soul's mouth actually curls up into a small smile.
Heart's jaw drops in shock, but in a happy shock.
"I got you to smile!" Heart cheers as he smothers Soul with another hug.
"Mmm."
Heart pulls away just to see if Soul's still smiling, and he is.
"You look like a dork, Soul."
"Alright, that's enough." Soul stands up again. "In the truck, come on. I have something there for you."
Heart stands up and follows Soul with an intense eagerness. Every step in the grass makes him more and more excited, so when they get to the truck a few minutes later Heart is head over heels with anticipation.
Soul pulls out the keys and unlocks the passenger door, then pulls out a Cardboard Bob plush.
"Here." He hands it to Heart. With a quiet squeal, he squeezes the plushie tightly. "I passed by a shelf of those when I was in a convenience store."
"Thank you," Heart whispers. He looks back to Soul. "Can we switch robes now?"
"Sure." They both set down their things and quickly make the switch. After that, they wordlessly clamber into the truck, with Heart on the passenger side and Soul in the driver's seat. Just like always.
Soul puts their bag in the back seat, and starts up the truck.
"Go to sleep, Heart," Soul says. Heart reclines his seat and holds the plushie to his chest. "We'll get something to eat soon."
"Ok," Heart replies quietly. He closes his eyes.
"One more thing."
"Hm?"
"Please, tell me if you need anything."
"Ok."
There are a million things he could tell Soul.
But he won't worry him. Not right now, anyways.
He'll just sleep.
Sleep is good now.