Title: Ten Days

See first chapter for warnings/disclaimer/pairings/etc.

A/N: The prototypical time line for an angst story brings tragedy in the second last chapter.

I've always questioned what truly defines tragedy.

DAY NINE

'Cause I don't know who I am, who I am without you
All I know is that I should
And I don't know if I could stand another hand upon you

I was almost certain my comprehension skills must have been shot, it was either that or Gabriel had decided on a new method to confuse and terrorize me, and this new method required him to be unnecessarily cryptic over everything he did and every action he made. He came rushing into the room we shared and started to rummage around for something, before his attention snapped to me, and the fact I was still awake. Just as hastily he moved to grab onto my shirt and pulled me to the door before shoving me outside and shutting the door in my face.

As I said: Unnecessarily cryptic.

Somehow in all this I had reverted back to a bad habit I'd picked up in my earlier adult years, a habit I'd only kicked because I had been forced to watch Kinomiya watch his brother die from a disease this habit was known to cause. I took a drag of the cigarette, exhaling with a sigh and shaking my head and looking up at the clear night sky. Takao had spent the greater part of the day avoiding and hiding from everyone, more specifically from myself, and the combination of his avoidance and my confusion of how to address the situation, time was simply ticking away and nothing was being resolved. I sighed quietly again bringing the cigarette to my mouth and breathing the smoke into my lungs.

"You know that's an awfully bad habit to pick up, Kai." I heard him state whilst he walked to stand beside where I sat. I grunted in response, and I heard him move to sit beside me shaking his head before taking the cigarette from where it rested loosely in my left hand and ashing it effortlessly before bringing it to his lips and inhaling.

"I thought you said it was a bad habit, Kinomiya." I watched him exhale into the night sky, the smoke leaving his lungs and dissipating into the night sky and then he let out an airy laugh handing me back the cigarette before speaking

"Sometimes bad habits are the only effective method of bringing down my stress levels and calming my nerves." He stated matter-of-factly causing me to turn my head to look at him. When my brain registered what appeared to be dried blood on his chin that had been haphazardly and carelessly wiped off but not totally removed I felt myself stuck between curiosity and concern.

"What the hell happened to your face Kinomiya?" I questioned, curiosity winning out above all else. I watched his gaze avert from where it had been fixed on the night sky to meet my own gaze and for a minute he seemed to weigh his options, debating how to respond to the question, eventually he spoke dully:

"Your boyfriend happened." The words were simple, but the weight of them was chilling. I suppose it suddenly made sense why Gabriel had been so cryptic when he'd essentially kicked me from the bedroom. However this information led to further confusion as I questioned why Takao hadn't simply thrown Gabriel out of the dojo upon being assaulted by the Italian... or better yet, why hadn't he called the authorities. Kinomiya was a nice person, but the idea that he'd let someone who'd just assaulted him stay under the same roof was ludicrous even for him.

"Why didn't you say anything about it?" I heard him say suddenly and my gaze shifted from the drying blood on his lips and chin up to those sad stormy blue eyes, inside me there was a tick of anger from the look he gave me, all I could do to not show that anger was do what I had always done before and keep my distance, to remain impartial.

"It's none of your business, Kinomiya." I said dryly trying to feign disinterest in the subject, I noticed the sadness in his eyes slowly start to shift to something else, irritation for certain maybe something more.

"Don't you dare say that." He snapped out of nowhere moving away from me before he spoke again

"I'm your friend Kai, seeing you being hurt is 100% my business." He looked me straight in the eye and I couldn't take it anymore, I couldn't take him anymore. His words, he was my friend. My friend. Nothing more, and it wasn't his business.

"Excuse me?" I lashed out unable to take his attitude and sense of entitlement. This had always infuriated me about him, how he'd always dig into other peoples business and act as if he'd done something that made him absolutely entitled to know what was going on.

"You vanish for eight years, show up almost entirely out of the blue, find out my relationship isn't exactly orthodox and suddenly you're demanding an explanation as to why I hadn't said anything about it?" I moved to stand in front of him and stare down at him, he met the stare with the same intensity, not backing down, never backing down. Suddenly I saw a flash of something in his eyes.

"You don't get it do you Hiwatari." He snarled in frustration pushing me against the nearest wall forcefully, the emotion in his distinctly morphing into rage as he continued on with his tangent.

"Well let me explain it to you since it's a logic I understand extremely well considering my choice profession." He let go of my shirt moving away from me, turning his back to me and running his hands through his hair his nerves becoming obvious he allowed a disheartened sigh escape his bloody lips

"If you don't help yourself, I can't help you." He spun around again, and our eyes met, and every piece of the puzzle fell into place, and I fell back into yet another old habit, and I fled the scene, leaving him standing there, not looking back at him not willing to see the look on his face, the glint in his eyes.

I rushed through the dojo taking care not to wake anyone up, my mind was in chaos, without the facade I would have openly been a mess, so many emotions I had long since pushed to the bottom were coming boiling to the surface, and one was front and center. Guilt. I couldn't help but not feel an overwhelming sense of guilt from leaving Takao standing there. Guilt for intruding on his life after so long, for messing it up again with my own problems. I'd let my selfishness take over time and time again, and as a result, I forced Takao o pay he price for that.

I moved into the bedroom where I'd been spending the nights, sleeplessly. I came face to face with green eyes, we stared at each other for a moment, staring in total silence. Eventually he pointedly shifted his body to reveal our bags had been packed before he spoke to me.

"We're leaving." The statement was simple, so simple it took me a moment to process it, but internally I supposed I had known this was coming when I had stood outside with Kinomiya, enjoying the late night air.

"I know." I replied matching the simplicity and he continued to stare at my blankly, eventually giving me a short not and turning to latch onto a suitcase handing it wordlessly to me before he grabbed onto his own and silently we left the room as barren as when we'd arrived.

I advanced towards the rental car with the Italian ahead of my by a few paces, he opened the back door haphazardly tossing suitcases inside the vehicle, he grabbed onto my own luggage also throwing it inside, slamming the door opening the driver side and slipping inside. I moved towards the passenger side, as I moved to enter the car I looked up at the dojo catching a glimpse of dark hair standing off to the side watching but not intervening, I looked away almost immediately getting inside the rental when I heard Gabriel rev the engine.

I'd had no idea where we were going so late in the night, nor did it seem Gabriel had any intention to inform me of our travel plans as we sat in silent in the dark car, only the sound of the motor running and the odd car passing us by was heard. I had to assume he probably just pulled from strings with one of the high-end hotels in the area getting us a room until our flight in two days. At some point during the car ride I must have dozed off for the first time since several nights prior when I'd dreamt of Kinomiya in the rain. I vaguely remember a mess of images my mind painted for me of his smile, of his touches, of his smell, of his voice, until I was abruptly pulled from them by the voice of my company.

"We're here." Again it was so simple, lacking it's normal malicious inflections as he cut the engine of the automobile and unhooked his belt before slipping out of the vehicle and heading towards the hotel. In the back of my mind I had a growing gear at how little he seemed to care about what was going on, but perhaps that was all apart of his game. A game he'd been playing for years.

We'd remained in absolute silence until we made it up into the room, however the moment the door closed I saw him turn on his heels and grab onto my shirt much like Takao had done only hours prior and he spoke to me, the words still hollow, still void.

"We need to talk." He didn't loosen his grip on me as he stared into my eyes, waiting for my response, seemingly waiting for what I had to say. I decided to humor him.

"About what?" I said allowing my eyebrow to arch slightly as the mans grip on me loosened and he slowly, seemingly uncertainly pulled away from me allowing his hand to drop to the side.

"You aren't coming back to Italy." He said nonchalantly, not really looking for a reply from me on the matter. I didn't know what to say or how to react to the statement. The man who had haunted and tormented me for seven years, the man who'd abused me and now he was seemingly letting me go, like I was yesterdays news, like I was that toy he was bored of.

But perhaps I was.

It hadn't occurred to me until just now that Gabriel probably was rapidly losing interest in his game with the recent addition of Takao to it, a character so outspoken and unpredictable that guessing his every move was totally impossible unless you were psychic, and that Sattiay was not.

"What makes you say that?" I said, allowing some of the curiosity I was experiencing to leak through in my voice, he laughed, I was taken back by it and noted him approach me and speak in a very low voice

"If I find out you're ever in Italy, if you're ever in my home, Kai..." He trailed off before leaning closer, moving onto his tiptoes to whisper the last part into my ears, to utter the threat I knew wasn't empty.

"...I'll make sure they never find you." He pulled away and that disgusting smile appeared on his lips as he turned and moved towards the other side of the hotel, before adding almost as an afterthought.

"Same goes for the Kinomiya brat for that matter." My jaw clenched when I heard it and my hands curled into fists at my sides, it was taking me all my willpower not to beat the snot out of the man in front of me. After a few moments regaining my composure I spoke to him, attempting to sound collected.

"I have business in Italy." I spoke the words firmly, and he seemed to stop and glance over at me, I couldn't figure out the emotions playing across his eyes.

"I don't believe you do." He said simply moving towards the bathroom and stopping at the door holding onto the handle.

"I'm sure you can see your way out of the hotel. Why don't you go chase stray cats around and brood in the streets like you used to. I need to get a proper rest, I have important and productive things to do in the morning." He sniffed the air, it reminded me of a certain Scotsman I had the misfortune of knowing bu instead of saying anything snide as I would to the McGregor I simply moved back towards the door and exited the hotel not caring to retrieve my luggage, not caring about any of he frivolous necessities most people relied on. This had been my first blatant opening to escape Gabriel Sattiay, and I wasn't going to be a fool and let it pass me by like I had many other things.

I hated to admit that it legitimately bothered me that I had only escaped the man on his terms. I'd only managed another shot at freedom because something, because someone had changed how his game worked, changed all the rules, and in turn, had made him bored of it.

Once again Takao Kinomiya had saved my life, and he probably didn't even know it.

It was a warm night, and perhaps ironically in my new found freedom I had found myself doing exactly as I'd been told. Moving through the cities empty streets in a specific direction wondering if I'd come face to face with an old friend of mine. When I'd arrived in the back alley, I moved right towards a small nook. I could hear small mewls and I couldn't help but smile when I came face to face with a small litter of kittens with their mother, the cat I had fed so long ago.

As I reached out to pet the mother cat, I was drowning in my thoughts of what to do. After over a decade of running from the truth, of running from reality. Could I really so simply disregard everything that had happened and walk into Kinomiya's life expecting it to come entirely natural? No matter how accepting a person he was anything between us wouldn't be easy. It would take work, commitment, effort and probably years. Was I willing to commit to that? Years where I wouldn't be able to run away from him. Years where doing so could be misconstrued as something else, where one small action could have a reaction so severe it ruined everything between us.

Was that worth it?

I felt the cat nip at my fingers noting that I'd stopped petting her at some point during my strenuous thought process. I still didn't have the answers I needed, I still didn't know where to go from here. I felt like an animal that had been raised in captivity all its life being released into the wild. I was overwhelmed, shell shocked even. I'd never truly had my life as my own, I had been a puppet to my grandfather for years, I'd been a slave to my own lust for power, and then I had fallen into a web of deceit. This was truly my first most profound moment of clarity, and I was left in this clarity having no idea what to do with myself as I stood in that back alley stroking the chin of this stray feline as her kittens nursed.

"You clear one obstacle to face many others, huh?" I sighed, speaking to no one in particular but the mother cat meowed seemingly in response to me, a ghost of a smile pressed on my lips as I scratched behind her ears, drowning out my thoughts with the sounds of her purring.

And I suppose what I had never realized was how true that statement really was, how genuine it was. In life everything is an obstacle we must either clear or be hindered by, and even if you succeed in getting past one obstacle there would be many more in your path. The only thing a person could do was meet them head on, to stand in defeat and continue on until they conquered whatever it was in their way. And I suppose what I had never accepted was that for so many years I had never been able to do just that, and that it was one of many reasons I both admired and needed Takao Kinomiya in my life.

So what's this one more obstacle in a world of infinite ones?

Everything and Nothing.

All I know is that I should
'Cause she will love you more than I could
She who dares to stand where I stood

I have a love-hate relationship with how this chapter ends, the last sentence is perfect and imperfect in every single way.

The next chapter will be the last one.

I'm intending to finish this story when I'm in recovery after surgery, unless I get some major motivation to finish before that.

Review.