Warnings: Suicidal ideation (skip the entirety of Sage's scene to —A—), parental abuse, cult material

Chapter 25

—A—

Trapped.

All I could think was that I was trapped in a mistake in a lie in a coverup in Trouble. The others bolstered me, saying there wasn't any danger— they were there. It was only their encouragement that allowed my voice to work. "I'm— I'm fine, Dad. Cye and Sage patched me up."

He sounded absolutely horrified with his next words. "They hurt you?"

I had told this story three times in two days I did not want to tell it again.

Cye saved me, quickly giving a recount of the events that had lead to my injury. In the process, I couldn't look at anyone's faces. Adrenaline coursed through my body more smoothly than blood, everything about this situation making me want to run. Dad's hand still hadn't left my shoulder, each new horrifying development producing a squeeze. Thankfully it was my good one.

Sage's voice was far crisper than I had heard it yet. "I wouldn't have said she was alright if she wasn't."

Dad carefully rubbed my shoulder bandage. "Are you sore?"

I shook my head. "Hardly feel a thing."

"C'mere." Almost before I could move, he had ushered me out of my chair and hugged me very, very gently. It was hard not to tremble as I returned his grip on automatic, especially as his hand rubbed up and down my back. "Has this… ever happened before?"

I swallowed and kept my eyes down. "Not… physically." When he pulled away in confusion I continued. "I'd. Be wearing my armour when they cut me, normally. This is the first time it's. Been worse."

Liv— I vaguely recalled she was technically my step mother, which just made the line of questioning feel worse— spoke next. She wasn't particularly harsh, but I didn't know what that tone of voice meant. "Sounds pretty physical to me."

I shook my head. "They always called it spiritual."

Kento's tone was equally impossible to determine. "It left marks on Dusk. That's not merely spiritual."

If nobody was happy then they were angry, and I was the cause of it. Trying not to melt into the floor I murmured, "I don't want to talk about it."

They both dropped it, at least. Dad turned his attention to his daughter. "Are you hurt?"

Tessa shifted her weight, Dawn hiding from the armour connection. She waited long moments before saying, "No."

Strata lurched in the connection enough I glanced at his face, his expression an attempted mask at that remark. I had to admit, I felt much the same, too. On the other hand, it was reassuring to not be alone in wanting no questions about injuries at all. I just wished I had been able to lie like that.

Maybe we were sisters after all.

Dad's relief was tempered, perhaps because he knew of that very tactic. "So they didn't hurt you?"

She paused again. "No…"

He reached out and squeezed her arms, desperate for answers. "Tess…"

She bristled, physically, spine straightening and pulling back. "I'm fine, Dad. Really."

Everyone else respected that lie, practicing the concept to not say anything until we were ready to talk about it. I still didn't trust they wouldn't spill my secrets, but at least now I could call them on hypocrisy should they do that.

Dad turned to the others, trying to pull out more of the story. "So… Cye and Sage are both… medics?"

Everyone slowly nodded, Ryo speaking for the group. "In a sense…yes."

Sage's breath spoke of practicing courtesy for others, his voice losing its edge from before. "While my degree is in kinesiology, I mostly heal through my armour."

Dad stared at him. "Your… armour."

He nodded. "With Cye's guidance for serious injuries, but for most, Halo directs me."

Dad almost looked frozen like a rabbit about to be pounced on. After spending so long running from the cult and its magic, their world had come back to haunt him… in a way he couldn't escape. "What are the odds they try to come back here?"

Ryo crossed his arms in annoyance. "About a hundred percent."

Rowen had finished his breakfast and was putting his bowl on the counter. His optimism sounded forced even to me. "It may take a while, though. We gave them a pretty rough blow. And now we know they know. It should make it that much harder for them to get the drop on us."

Liv took his empty seat. "What can we do to help?"

I sat back down, poking my food in an attempt to make myself hungry again. "Find your own armour."

Cye ignored my remark, actually bothering to answer something other than 'nothing'. "We have others watching the cult. They should be able to warn us before anything happens."

Everyone went quiet after that, notes of resignation draining the tension and fear enough I could consider another bite. It took me far too long to get through just one, and my stomach wanted to reject the concept of more food. The nausea was intense enough I considered breaking down crying over feeling it, everything about today Wrong and Dangerous. Even Tessa wouldn't talk to me. I didn't know if she would again. If any of them would again.

In the middle of my internal debate on whether or not I could afford to abandon my barely-touched meal with Dad and Liv around, Dad put a hand on my shoulder. "I'm proud of you for saving her."

My jaw clamped shut, eyes following suit to not burst into tears for a different reason.

"How long has it been since you heard that?"

That required an answer. I tried to get my vocal cords to work. "Y-years…"

His voice sounded. Kind. Warm, even. "Guess I've got a lot of catching up to do."

I stood to cry into his chest, everything about today officially Too Much. Normally kindness wasn't enough to get me to burst into tears. I tried to mollify the hatred I was so weak on this with the thought I hadn't gotten parental kindness. Ever. Except maybe when he'd been married to my mom.

He rubbed my back, voice quiet. "You always were a fighter."

I hugged him tighter, pressing my face into his shoulder. He'd never not been kind to me. Always been more like my dad in the few years I'd known him than any other older male figure in my life. I tried to silence the voice telling me him knowing I was a fighter was exactly why he'd abandoned me to my mother. I succeeded enough to not lash out.

Once my outburst had finally quieted down, we all turned back to filling in Dad and Liv on what had happened, trying to figure out what to do next.

Somehow, I got through half of breakfast.

—~—

Sage hadn't felt the edges of his counternance— his recovery, his control— unravel to this degree in years.

He was suicidal. As much as he wanted to deny it, as much as he had told Alexa he simply wanted to self harm, what he really wanted to do was die. What he really wanted to do was not face the future his mind was spinning. Part of him knew it was his mind playing tricks on him. He didn't want to listen. He didn't care how remote the chance was, he didn't want to face a world where his friends weren't there.

Rowen already wasn't there, him off to think because he had too much on his shoulders. Shielded because he didn't want to be with anyone. Rowen would continue to not be there. Everyone was going to leave and the net that had caught him so often was coming apart at the seams.

The worst part was, he knew the others saw his state of mind. He wanted to retreat back into his own world and not face them; he'd already turned down Kento's offer to spar.

When Cye offered to go for a walk early in the afternoon, he knew he couldn't refuse. Next to talk to him would be Ryo, and he could never truly dodge his leader's line of questioning. He could only barely dodge Cye, but it would be less shameful.

They walked out of the house towards the pasture, Cye waiting until they were near the fence to speak. His voice was his medic's voice, the one he used to calm those on the verge of hysteria. "We all know that night was hard on you."

Sage didn't respond until he was leaning against the fence, making a point to not look at the older Ronin. "At this point, that night is the least of my worries."

He put a hand on Sage's shoulder. "Burdens are meant to be shared, lest the load break the horse's back."

Sage folded his hands together, trying to find the right combination of pressure to settle himself. Nothing worked. He knew answering that would lead to places he didn't want to go. But he couldn't refuse Cye. Not completely. "It's not like I'll be able to share it, soon."

Cye shifted to lean against the fence, arms crossed atop it. Suiko impressed the importance behind his look. "Even if you may feel unable now…the situation we find ourselves in may demand otherwise."

He wasn't going to face it. "Whether or not the situation demands it is irrelevant."

"It's not irrelevant if it's going to effect how well you can fight, or how much these girls can depend on you. How much we depend on you," Cye replied firmly. He softened after a moment. "Ryo—all of us— noticed you're isolating. Kento and I agreed we need to reach out for your sake as much as his."

Sage's fists tensed before he forced them to relax. He had to face it. The thought drove him to rage without an outlet, all of it dying to a quiet, simple, "It's not like we'll be able to keep this after graduation."

Even though Cye and Rowen were years off graduating, Sage was graduating at the end of the school year next March. His life would be dedicated to training and teaching kendo; Cye and Rowen would have more demands on their time in their final stretch of education, something Sage had already felt as their class loads increased. Ryo and Kento had been struggling to meet up for years, their work demanding more time than their high school classes ever had.

They would be moving even farther apart from each other. Emotionally and physically.

Cye followed his thoughts, laying a hand on Sage's. He was softer, now. More like a friend than a medic. "You're not the only one struggling with that thought. It's a valid fear. But I do hope this is one thing we all want to prevent. It's possible to make the effort to stay in touch. And with the yoroi we'll likely never be truly apart."

Sage shook his head. "Everything's about to change again, and for how I relapsed the first time… even knowing that."

"Just because we see the trials coming doesn't make it any easier to go through." A soft smile punctuated Cye's statement. "It simply gives us an opportunity to prepare for it."

He heard his own voice roughening. Whether it was from anger or sorrow he couldn't tell. "There's nothing that can be done. Rowen won't be able to just fly over so I can spend the night. We'll all be working odd hours, without the time and ability to be there as much as we were."

Cye squeezed his hand. "That doesn't change our commitment to the team. To our friendships. Throwing that all away would dishonor everything we've gone through and everything we've fought for up to this point." He paused to emphasize his next words, every ounce of the integrity of his yoroi in them. "We will find a way. This much I know."

He thought about that. He thought about how they had found ways before, when his self harm urges had begun after they'd stopped living together. How it had all relied on Rowen's ability to drop everything at a moment's notice to go get him. How that could leave so quickly with life's demand. He had his cigarettes for emergencies, but they were a temporary fix that could become impossible to hide should his usage increase.

Lingering anger he had tried to stuff away came to the forefront. "That won't be enough. Nothing will be enough. I was away from him for hours and I want to kill myself, still, and thinking of being away from him brings it back. I thought—"

Tenku surged out to comfort him.

Rowen had heard it all.

Sage froze, barely able to breathe at the thought he had done this to his brother again. He knew Rowen felt just as frozen, guilt gripping them both. He couldn't turn to face the man standing all of two feet away.

Rowen's voice sounded like it was directed to the ground. "I am so, deeply sorry, my brother."

The archaic Japanese—the kind Sage was the most familiar with, the kind he had grown up learning, the kind only his family spoke to him in—made his shoulders hunch forward in a way that hadn't happened since his last suicide attempt. His knees locked just to keep himself standing, breaths still not coming any semblance of easily. Tears pricked at the corners of his eyes but so long as he stayed like this he could keep them at bay.

Rowen stepped forward and pulled him into a hug, one hand on the back of his head as he forced Sage to face him.

Sage broke, arms tight around Rowen's chest and a sob escaping into Rowen's neck. One hand tangled in his hair, the other took a fistfull of his sweater. "I thought I was better than this."

Rowen held him tighter. "No one is better than their weaknesses. One merely learns to embrace them like an old friend."

His breath continued its haggard trek, a single sob turning into more. Everything he had been trying to hide from Rowen—all of them—came flooding out, from fears about coping without the structure of school to the helplessness against his demons two nights prior. He couldn't cope with one change, which undermined his ability to cope with any change. Terror at himself he thought locked away ruled his mind, the terror he refused to even name.

He hadn't felt so raw in years. "Nothing feels right unless you're here. I wish it wasn't that way."

Rowen squeezed him. "I understand. I represent a star on the night of a new moon, to you. Without the constellations, you have nothing by which to guide you through darkness."

Sage nodded along with that. "I haven't stood on my own since…"

Rowen knew him well enough to know what that fear was, under the surface. The fear he never would stand alone again. He hadn't since his second suicide attempt, but if he was honest, he hadn't stood on his own since Kaos had saved him. His lack of independence made him want to die all over again.

The others had come out since the start of the conversation, which just drove Sage to hide more against Rowen. Everyone else joined in on the hug, disappointment they hadn't helped him mixing with Sage's own shame they hadn't been enough.

Ryo was the closest, pressing into his back. "None of us could have known that was going to be the result. Just because we're hurt doesn't mean any of us did anything wrong."

Sage remembered Alexa telling them the same thing earlier that day. He tried to pull himself together, resolve for silence worn down to nothing. "That doesn't change the fact so much is about to change and… I'm afraid…"

"Even if we're not physically there through the change, what doesn't change is our bonds to the others," Rowen said softly. "Just because it might be more difficult for us to respond immediately doesn't mean we're just going to cut each other out of our lives completely"

Sage pressed his lips together, anger at himself for his own illness still raging after all these years. "I keep wishing I could stand on my own."

Rowen looped one of Sage's arms around his shoulder, small smile—almost a smirk—on his lips. "Right now, you don't have to. Just concentrate on being stronger than you were, and when you grow weak we'll be there to carry you. Everyone needs a rest every so often"

Sage dared a glance at Rowen, the man he always wanted to call his lover, the others forgotten for the second time since leaving the house. "You have already carried me so much…"

Rowen returned the intensity of feeling, even if it was different. "And I'll carry you to the ends of the earth and the last of our days, as much as I have to to keep you alive with us."

His eyes filled with tears again, turning back into his brother. Sage somehow found the strength to hold onto him, even if the thought of holding onto his own life was too much. "I don't know what I would do without you."

Rowen's arms wrapped around him a second time. "I believe you would find strength to seek out other lights, other constellations under another sky." Tenku gestured towards the others. "Starting with them."

It extended to the house, as well, including the girls.

Including Alexa, who might be hiding just as many suicidal urges for the same reason he wanted to die.

He couldn't stand the thought of leaving the Ronin yet. Not when this wound still felt like it was bleeding. "I didn't want you to know… not after we had all accepted nothing could have stopped this."

Kento reached out and clasped his shoulder. "Just cause nothing could've stopped it doesn't mean we didn't get hurt."

Sage tried not to glance at the man beside him. "I knew you all felt guilty enough for the results of that night."

Cye shook his head. "We felt guilty because taking care of each other is all of our responsibility, and we couldn't ease your suffering. We don't want you to be in so much pain, regardless of its source."

Ryo put his hands on both of Sage's shoulders, eyes burning with Wildfire's intensity. "Being alone is what caused our traumas. And to heal, we need to stick together. No matter what life throws at us, we will always need each other. That doesn't change no matter what."

"Do you remember how far away we were when I launched that arrow into Arago's palace?"

Sage shook his head

"I could barely see the tips of the structure. It took us what felt like days after to reach the inner courtyards." Rowen smiled. "So just because I'm a thousand miles away doesn't mean I can't reach you."

Sage's exhale was shaky as he remembered something that should have been traumatizing, but in the end hadn't been. "It didn't seem to matter, to us. So long as we knew you were coming…" Suiko and Kongo agreed, all of them about to move forward when Sage couldn't hold in a soft laugh that came out in a breath. "Why do I feel there's a metaphor in that concept, in the form of…" He looked down. "The bond and effort being more important than the time it takes to accomplish the task."

Ryo broke out into a lopsided smile. "Because that's what being a Ronin is all about."

The wound stopped bleeding. Or, at least, stopped enough that he could isolate his nightmares to a remote possibility. They would still be there for each other. They didn't blame him for his inability to relax when they had all tried to help him without succeeding. Rowen would still be there as long as he physically could be there, even if it took him longer than any of them would like.

It would be okay. Okay enough he could stop feeling like there was only one option.

They needed to check on the girls.

—A—

Group activities were, by far and wide, my least favourite type of activity.

After everyone else had come back inside, all they wanted to do was group activities. Board games, video games, card games. Together activities. Activities that made me feel more alone than anything else. Activities that made me want to throw things and scream to stop trying to be normal. It wasn't normal and everyone needed to act like it.

This was an irrational thought. I could tell by how I was the only one who held it, another glass wall between them and me that just proved how different I was. How crazy I was. How troublesome and wet-blanket-like and I could hear my mother's voice telling me I always ruined everyone's attempts at having fun.

If I was going to feel this alone, I wanted to actually be alone.

I slipped out the back door after filling up my water bottle, trying to ignore Tessa's knife on the table. If they spotted it missing they'd panic, and I didn't want there to be a panic. I wanted them to not notice I had even left.

Once outside, I looked over the area. The barn felt too conspicuous, the pasture too open. Trees it was, then. As if I could pretend to hide in a new-growth forest, sparsely populated— Tessa had told me about the sheer amount of open space she had used for mock sword fights. But it was the illusion of vanishing. Something the house or the barn couldn't give me.

Before I had even decided to head down that way, Sage had followed me out and placed a hand on my shoulder.

"I'm not going to do anything," I murmured. It was true enough it wasn't a lie. I wanted to. I wasn't going to.

"Regardless of whether or not you are," he began softly, "company after an ordeal can help more than true aloneness."

Spoken like a true suicide survivor.

We both walked in the forest, Sage letting me lead. I didn't care about potentially shaking him even though the armours made that impossible; I was barely even worried about ticks in the region.

I finally found a place secluded enough from everything I felt okay in it. I settled down with my back to a tree, Sage finding a place diagonally across from me where he could sit cross-legged. Close enough he could scoot over and hold me, but far enough he wasn't actually in my personal space.

When we had been sitting in silence for a few moments, Sage leaned forward, elbows on his knees. "I… did want to talk to you, however, if you'll have the conversation."

I snorted. "I hate being around other suicidal people…" At his unease at that statement, I quickly added, "I mean. You'd know what to look for and sometimes I just. Say pitch black statements for humour."

He still looked unsure at that, but he continued regardless. "I… realized earlier I was suicidal again. Since you had been through so similar, it. Only made sense I ask you."

I shrugged one shoulder. "I told the kids at the compound I'd be there for them if they reached out, so that kind of stops my plans in their tracks."

"That doesn't change the lingering feelings," he replied. "Regardless of whether or not you want to act on them, I wanted to make sure you were alright."

I looked down at the leafy underbrush. "I'm not in the mood to get reassurance it's all going to be okay, or anything like that."

"Commiserating, then?"

I shrugged.

He leaned back, running his fingers through his hair. "What tripped mine was the thought of Rowen not being around, anymore. I'm graduating too soon for my own comfort and the thought that night Rowen was taken might become our lives, with work… was overwhelming."

I swallowed. "Tessa's going into intelligence and getting deployed so I already know that night is going to be our lives. I need to learn to live with it."

He winced. "You will have the armour connection, however."

One shoulder went up and down in another shrug. "She could still be kidnapped by enemy forces and in danger. My only comfort is Dawn won't let her die."

The military. An entity that demanded its soldiers as property, that controlled everything about their lives when you got down to brass tacks, and demanded loyalty above all else. If the military called her first, or called her second, or hell, even called her third, she would have to answer because they jumped to priority queue and she had signed her life away to them already.

If I didn't hate anti-government extremist groups for the violence they dished out to innocents—and if keeping no police record wasn't part of my lease—I would've joined anti-government groups years ago. But if my friends organized a targeted anti government protest that had the potential for violence, I wouldn't stop them.

My brooding broke when a large tabby cat padded out of the trees. I reached out a hand to stroke Tazer, who had been playing shy since everyone had arrived. Tessa's cat wasn't used to this much company. Us isolated out of the house had to make him more comfortable.

I still barely acknowledged the man in front of me, trying to force all my attention on the very curious cat.

Sage studied me in my silence. "There's more to it than that, isn't there?"

I ran my tongue over my teeth. "Maybe."

"And you're not going to tell me."

"Nope."

"Very well." He shifted, leaning his neck to one side to stretch it. "Does anything help, in these moods?"

I laughed, possibly too darkly for comfort. "You mean other than dancing to exhaustion and ignoring everything in favour of writing or mindless games? Nothing healthy, and nothing I can do on this much injury."

He leveled one violet eye on me, gaze inviting. "Ballroom would be less strenuous."

I looked down at the ground. "I'm not learning a whole new dance style like this."

He gestured towards me. "What is 'like this', so I know when to offer next?"

I swallowed, caught between glaring and commending him for trapping me in this line of questioning. "Injured. Starving. Wanting to rip my skin off. No skillful qualities other than brute force and espionage."

He put a hand on my knee. "Isn't that the perfect time to feel like a princess?"

I raised an eyebrow at him. "With you as the prince, of course."

He laughed softly. "I am but a samurai, although I believe Tessa would have some comparison."

That got a smile out of me, but I shook my head. "Really… I'm not in the mood."

"Very well." He let silence hang for a little while longer. "I know you'd rather I leave you alone-alone, but I'm not going to. None of us, individually, will. We're all here with you. I'm even standing on the edge of being suicidal with you. We can only heal together."

I picked up a leaf and began ripping it apart, ignoring a sniffing kitty. "My own sister won't even talk to me."

He scooted closer, his hand taking mine. "And my brother wouldn't talk to me until I went out and he overheard what I was saying. I had tried to spare him my feelings, but in so doing, put up a wall between us."

My hand tightened into a fist. "She doesn't need to hear what I went through. She went through enough."

My fist nearly vanished between his palms, his hands dwarfing mine. "And you went through just as much, even if your battles feel like nothing because most of them were in your mind. They were as real as hers."

My fist loosened, whole body drooping. "She told me the reason I was getting hurt was I wasn't following god and if I hadn't left none of this would've happened."

"Your mother?" At my nod, he worked his fingers around mine. "She's lying. I know you know that, but I know how hearing it's a lie helps."

I shook my head. "I don't believe it's a lie…"

He reached up and brushed my cheek with the back of his fingers, hand resting on the side of my neck. "Then we will remind you as much as it takes for you to believe it."

My breath hitched.

He pulled me closer with a gentle but firm grip on my shoulder, my hand still on his lap and forehead tipped against his chest. He held me loosely but protectively, soft strokes on the back of my neck drawing out the crying fit I'd wanted to have all morning.

"I would've had Tessa with Michael dating her, I would've had my mom and my step dad and a community and a life plan and—"

"You wouldn't be happy."

"That isn't important."

He gave off a sense of quiet, challenging, disbelief.

"There was only divine happiness which you'd get later, human happiness was fleeting and imperfect and not worth doing anything with because you shouldn't build a human life, you should…" I trailed off, not wanting to complete my thought.

He turned his head towards me, jaw pressing into my hair. "You should what?"

I wanted to reply that I didn't know. I desperately, desperately wanted to reply I didn't know. But he wouldn't be satisfied with that. "Your soul should live in youja fire constantly so you could eventually earn heaven."

He stroked my back. "A lifetime of suffering doesn't sound like a life."

I scrunched my eyes shut. "It wasn't meant to be a life."

"And you wanted more."

I nodded.

He pulled back so I could see his face, bangs pushed aside slightly so both his eyes could show the compassion Halo gave Dusk. "You're not wrong for wanting more."

My body felt numb even though I knew I was crying. Hearing that from somebody who barely knew me, barely knew the situation, felt in many ways more validating than Tessa— sometimes I doubted her reassurance, because I exaggerated the emotional effects when I was tired, when I was having a flashback. I would eventually doubt Sage, too, but for now.

For now, I hadn't realized how much I needed to hear that.

He pulled me back against him, soft humming mixed with purring from my lap as I cried until I was spent.

Summary: Sage and Cye talk about staying friends through change, the others joining in to reassure each other they won't stop being friends no matter what happens, even adding new members to the group.