Gothix

by Moro-moro

How much strength does it take to live? To move forward even when your body no longer wants to move? What is that called? Maturity? Growing up? The only certain thing in this world is this: I cannot stand up on my own. AU; see inside for warnings

37. Lesson Twenty: Aftermath

Gothix, Lesson Twenty: Aftermath

Bring me home in a blinding dream,
Through the secrets that I have seen—
Wash the sorrow from off my skin,
And show me how to be whole again…

"Come back with me."

Fai felt his face grow hot as the room spun around him; he blinked once, twice before shaking his head. "What?" he asked in disbelief. There was no way that what he thought he heard meant what he thought it did. And in any case, it seemed like Kurogane had a girlfriend (or someone like that), he remembered with a pang. He had to be reading into it more than the elder had meant for him to.

"Come home with me, Fai," Kurogane said softly; "I moved… so there's an extra room… In any case, at least until you've gotten used to your cast… stay with me."

"Well isn't someone presumptuous?"

"Ohjiro, leave him alone," Fai muttered miserably, pulling his attention away from Kurogane and to the older man.

Ohjiro raised an eyebrow, silently grateful that looks could not kill, as he would be dead twice over. "Well," the man sighed, casting a knowing glance towards the darker of the two teens; "It was, considering."

Kurogane scowled threateningly as Fai gave a heavy sigh; "Don't pretend like you know what's going on," the blonde said tersely. The elder looked up at Fai, studying his face. The blonde looked tired and frustrated, pale face dark with bruises. He knew the look Fai wore all too well; Fai was close to shutting Ohjiro out completely in irritation.

"Um. I'm going—I'm going to go," Kurogane said uneasily, rising to his feet. It was his fault, of course, that the tension between Fai and Ohjiro was there in the first place—there had been a bit of a disagreement over him between Fai and Ohjiro late the night before about his presence in the room. He'd offered to go home, but Fai had protested and stubbornly insisted that he should say, ignoring Ohjiro's arguments against it. And on top of that, Kurogane felt ridiculous, having shouted at the blonde's guardian like he had the night before. He could feel Ohjiro's eyes on him, evaluating him coldly even now. It was rather humiliating; he'd ended up proving Ohjiro completely right. He knew absolutely nothing about Fai's life.

"Ah—um—" Fai reached out hesitantly, fingers closing around the hem of Kurogane's shirt. "We… We're not quite done talking yet," he said softly, frowning.

"Oh, well… I guess you could call me when you're ready?" Kurogane offered, flushing. This was entirely too awkward. If he'd previously thought being around Tomoyo or even his aunt with Fai was the worst thing that could ever happen, he was completely wrong: this was the single most mortifying experience of his life. Maybe if he was more comfortable in the tenuous relationship—or lack of one—he had with Fai or maybe if he wasn't so emotionally exhausted, it wouldn't be half as bad, but as it was… It was pretty bad.

Fai fidgeted and turned pink as well, twisting the cloth between his fingers. "See… um… I… my phone broke—really!" he said loudly, looking up in a moment of flushed frustration at an indignant snort from Ohjiro's corner of the room. "And so… you won't be able to get a hold of me… that way… Um. C…could you just meet us at my apartment?"

"Fai!"

"Shut up! Don't decide you suddenly want to hover over my shoulder like a parent!"

"It's technically my apartment anyway," Ohjiro retorted, bristling, "And don't make him wait out in the cold like you think I'm just going to let you go back on with your life without talking to you about things!"

"I thought we had talked!" Fai protested in dismay, eyes wide with what Kurogane recognized as fear.

"Um," he cut in, gently taking Fai's hand from his shirt. "How about I come over at… um, well, it's eleven now. Does one sound okay? I could bring food over, and I need to go talk to coach about… about, you know," Kurogane said softly, rubbing his thumb against Fai's knuckles. "That way you can talk with—with Ohjiro-san," he said uncomfortably, "And I'm not just barging in unannounced."

"I invited you, you wouldn't be unannounced," Fai said with a frown, obviously implying that Ohjiro's presence was. "But yeah… I suppose that would be alright."

"Okay. I'll see you then."

Fai watched Kurogane leave unhappily, scowling up at Ohjiro. "Well, there, he's gone. Are you happy?"

"Marginally," Ohjiro remarked dryly. He leaned back into the wall, arms crossed over his chest. He supposed he could have been slightly less abrasive towards Kurogane, but he couldn't help it. The boy was presumptuous after all, and it was, at least, in Ohjiro's role to be prickly towards whomever Fai dated. Even though he'd never thought Fai would willingly date someone, to be honest. He'd never prepared himself for that, and at the time, Fai had been too young to be debriefed on that matter, so they'd never come to any sort of agreement about what was and what wasn't acceptable in the blonde's… situation.

"God, you're just—"

"I know, I know. Incorrigible, right?"

"I was going to say a dick, but fine," Fai sulked, snatching up his bookbag from where Watanuki had left it for him.

Ohjiro heaved a sigh as he pulled the door open for Fai as he skulked past. "I know you're mad," he said wearily, "But—"

"Of course I'm mad!" Fai snapped, glaring up at Ohjiro with tears in his eyes, "If I'm going to have to let him go, at least let me have what time I can steal!"

"…It doesn't work like that. If you've made the decision to let him go, then why bother to make it hurt worse by stealing his own time? Y'know… how selfish is that?" Ohjiro said quietly. "You're making it worse for him, in the end."

Fai's face contorted in pain, looking away from the man. "I know I am, but—but I… I can't leave him be. It's not healthy, but I can't leave him…"

"…As long as you know what you're doing to yourself, and to him… what I said last night still stands."

XxXxXxX

It wasn't as if the irony was lost on her entirely: Just barely a day ago, he had asked her to leave Koryo with him; now she found herself without any significant money or food or clothes other than what she had entered the hospital with, speeding over the city limits one by one without him. But he had wanted to go somewhere farther than where they were headed, at a time when she could not follow him.

She had turned her phone off as Shaoran had cranked his car outside of the city cemetery, the tinges of dawn staining the sky pink. She had taken his hand, and had not let go, even as the hours passed by with the scenery outside of their windows.

She did not know where they were going; she didn't even care all that much. She supposed it wouldn't even matter, really, if they drove off of the edge of the world entirely. If the road ran out and they continued to drive, would it be into their arms? Maybe it would matter, one day, far in the future… if they made it that far.

She supposed that maybe she should have told her parents that they were going, regardless of the fact that they didn't know where they were going. Touya was, without a doubt, freaking out.

But she couldn't really bring herself to care all that much.

"Why… Everything got so messed up," she whispered to the silence between them. Shaoran glanced at her out of the corner of his eyes, frown deepening in his own answer. "Why?"

The two unspoken passengers that sat between her and Shaoran offered no answer. The dead do not talk lightly, and even they cannot answer a question as all-encompassing as 'why'. The dead could only whisper the words of memories, fading echoes of the 'how'.

Eventually, Shaoran answered: "Things fall apart," he said simply. "And people are weak."

Sakura gave a quiet sob, burying her face against her knees. Her heart was breaking. There never had been a way to save everyone while leaving herself intact, was there? It had never been within her capabilities to do so. It didn't matter what she could have done, she would have ended up with an empty hand and her heart in pieces.

Syaoron had always been dead; he'd been dead since the day that Tsubasa had died. His heart, his life, his time had always been paused on that one moment while everyone else moved forward and made new friends, and loved and healed without him. How painful was it for him to watch that— to stand, frozen, with his hand outstretched towards a dead girl's memories while everyone else slipped from him as well? Sure it wasn't so painful that death was the only choice. Surely, surely, she told herself, surely it wasn't.

But in the end, it had been—he was gone, and there truly were hurts in life that were so brutally painful that to those so wounded by them, death was a blissful reprieve.

Weren't they enough? Had they ever been enough? Wasn't the fact that she and Shaoran were still alive enough for him to move on and live? Why—why hadn't it been enough? How could she not have been strong enough to protect him from himself? For herself, for her sister, for Shaoran?

In that moment, she thought of Fai and Kurogane, who, even though they loved each other dearly and struggled to be strong despite the hurts life had dealt them, were not enough to overcome that pain. No one was strong enough. Why was no one strong enough to overcome this one thing?!

It hurt. Nothing they could have done could have saved him. She had been blind to Syaoron's pain for so long that even when her eyes had been opened, it was too late to do anything about it.

Shaoran grit his teeth, and trained his eyes on the road, speeding faster towards the horizon. He would not be frozen in this; he would not let his time be stopped as well. He had to escape this.

XxXxXxX

It was a selfish wish, he was sure of it. To take advantage of Fai when he was down and weak and injured… it was selfish. But there was hope in it, he knew from the way his ribs ached from the impact of Fai's fist to the soft spark that had ignited in those blue eyes when he'd told the blonde that there was no sense in forgiving him.

There wasn't one, really, except for the old clichéd excuse that love solved everything. This was very obviously bullshit, judging from the night's losses. Kurogane sighed, clenching his fists around the wheel of his car, wishing he could simply lay his head down and sleep. If he slept, maybe, he'd wake up beside Fai to find that this had all been a particularly bad, albeit realistically painful, dream. Was that giving in—to want it all to be a dream, to want it to disappear?

The empty pain of death wasn't unusual to him; no, in fact, it was an old friend of his. But like the most stubborn of old friends, it was unwelcome and generally greeted with a door to the face and tears and screaming profanities. The friend that was death was unwelcome in his home of a heart, and it lingered, giving nothing and taking everything.

Kurogane gave a quiet grumble, very much unwilling to haul himself up out of his car and onto his feet. But he did so, the quiet mental commands he gave himself—now step forward, asshole, go on—taking him step by step up the walkway to Fai's apartment.

Going to see Kusanagi on its own hadn't been an undesirable task, for the most part. The man was just as much as a mentor to Kurogane as Clow had become over the years facing his parents' deaths; he'd been here several times. He was actually quite fond of the man and his young wife, who had likewise greeted him fondly. There were times, yes, where he'd come bearing bad news—he'd been suspended again, he'd failed a test, or even the time where he'd come after running away from his aunt's house for the first time—but… it had never been something this heavy.

It had been a lie, to begin with, when he'd told Fai that he was going to visit to impart the news… but he couldn't bear lying to Fai… and Kusanagi had the right to know, and it was Kurogane's job, as captain of the team and once-mentor to Syaoron himself, to come. He'd realized as he rang the bell to his coach's house that the adult probably already knew. Clow was close to almost every adult that Kurogane knew—probably from his connections to Yuuko at the school and his own job as a police officer in town— as was Yuuko herself. And Syaoron was a student at the school… But even so, the man had appreciated the gesture, and had sent him off with a minimal amount of pity and a clap on the shoulder.

The way the man had told him to watch out for the rest of the team and come to him if help was needed was innocent, but it made Kurogane's insides squirm with guilt and exhaustion. There was nothing he could have done, he knew. But… but… Was this how Fai felt on a daily basis?

To know something indelibly, to know that it was true while this—this nagging feeling of darkness, of listless unease and guilt wore down at everything until what made you undoubtedly you was even questionable… Was this what it was like, for Fai? For Syaoron, even? Could it go from this trickle of apprehension and guilt into a roar of abject loathing for everything so easily that one's very soul could be consumed by it? How quickly, how easily; how, why? Why?

He was so consumed in his thoughts that he'd barely noticed that he'd dragged himself up the iron and concrete stairwell to Fai's floor. Not only had he made it, but he'd managed to knock on the door without really registering his actions until he was face to face with the blonde.

"Is it like this every day?"

Fai frowned, looking up at Kurogane; the elder boy looked tired beyond belief. Even more exhausted than he had in the hospital, even. He pursed his lips briefly, processing the question. "Oh, Kuro-sama," he breathed quietly, the pieces clicking into place slowly. He reached out gently, slipping his fingers against Kurogane's tightly closed fist.

Kurogane relaxed his hand under the cool touch, allowing Fai to wind his fingers through his own. There was something in Fai's voice that spoke of a gentle sorrow that wasn't related to grief or death or even guilt in any manner, but rather something akin to pity. But it wasn't anything as contemptuous as pity itself, but rather something gentle. It dawned on him that this was empathy, this quiet pressure of Fai's cool fingers in his own, this softness in the voice that could scream out itself in sorrow and anger and move a crowd to tears and cheers. He'd never truly heard this before; perhaps because he and Fai were truly and indelibly different in some ridiculously cosmic scale that there had never really been anything to empathize over and yet now…

Fai gently tugged Kurogane inside, guiding him quietly to the messy sofa that he'd been lounging on until the elder had come to his door. He knew what Kurogane must be feeling, and he knew that it needed to be stopped. But was he, of all people, even qualified to help? He'd failed so horribly to help himself, and to help when Syaoron had come to him, but he could barely imagine what would happen if he failed to help Kurogane now. He sat down next to the elder, letting Kurogane's hand rest in his lap.

"You know," Fai said carefully, "It doesn't have to feel like that, if you don't want it to."

Kurogane looked over at Fai, frowning; "You let it wreck you," he replied sharply.

Fai winced, then turned his head away, lost for words. He bit down on the inside of his lip, teeth worrying the flesh back and forth. "Yes," he whispered, "I let my own grief wreck me. But I had far more blame, and I was younger… And you—your parents, you worked through that before."

"Yeah, by destroying everything I ever touched out of anger." Kurogane paused in his bitterness, taking the second to truly look at Fai. The blonde looked close to tears, hand shaking against Kurogane's fingers, jaw tight. "… Even you."

Fai shook his head roughly, the coppery taste of blood rising against his tongue forcing him to unclench his jaw. "I—I was already broken," he spat. He relinquished his grasp on Kurogane's hand before moving to stand. "I never was whole to begin with, never." He shivered, wrapping his arm around himself; he felt miserable. His arm hurt, his face hurt, he was sleepy from the medicine the nurses had given him before he'd left the hospital, and all he felt like doing was to curl up in a ball and cry. "If you've come to throw everything I say in my face, you can leave and go elsewhere for comfort. I—I can say what I can because I know what I did wrong." It was cold in the apartment, he thought idly, trying to race through thoughts to keep himself steady. He didn't need Kurogane to remind him just how messed up he was; Fai knew that well enough already.

"Fai," Kurogane said quietly, "Don't be like that."

Fai grit his teeth to keep himself from lashing out at the elder. That wasn't what Kurogane needed, and Fai wasn't willing to waste the time he could get with the teen fighting. "…It's the truth," he said flatly, settling himself against the wall. He sunk down to the floor and laid his head on his knees, looking over at Kurogane through his bangs. "I never knew that I didn't have to let it wreck me, as you put it…But now, I… but it's too late for me." It hurt, being told by the one person who'd always insisted that he was perfect and beautiful that he'd always been, in fact, 'wrecked'. He closed his eyes, inhaling slowly to calm himself down. What was it about Kurogane that reduced him to this quivering mass of anger and sorrow and longing? Why?

"Then what do you suggest I do?"

"You live," Fai replied, voice flat. "You just go on. You either realize that they didn't care enough about you to spare you this and you let go, or you remember that they cared so much that they just couldn't handle it anymore. Or you don't agonize over it and you find something that helps you let go and accept the fact that no matter how much you grieve, they won't come back. In the end, the result is the same: you live."

"That seems harsh."

"You know it is," the blonde snapped, "You know that! I know that! But life is harsh—if it wasn't, do you think I'd be like I am!? That he'd be dead, and I'd be left with the guilt of not being able to save anyone at all? If the world was anything but harsh, do you think that would happen?!"

"Fai…"

"Just go— just leave me alone," Fai whispered, shaking his head. He pressed his face closer into his arm, biting down hard on his lip to keep it from trembling. Why hadn't he realized what Syaoron had wanted from him? Why? It was his fault. He had been the boy's last hope, the cry for help before the slip into the dark, and he'd ignored it. How could he face his friends knowing this?

Kurogane stood slowly, watching as Fai's shoulders shook as the boy silently cried. He was such a hypocrite. He sat and he lectured without even understanding, then let himself wallow in the very feelings he detested the most. He'd lashed out at the one person he'd ever let himself be weak around, taking Fai's sympathy for granted. He was spoiled and petty, and he hated himself for that. He knelt down next to the blonde and pulled him forward, pressing his cheek into Fai's hair. "…I know you're trying your best," he said softly, "I'm sorry for not treating you like you are."

Fai reached out and gently pushed himself away from the elder, "No," he said. "Kurogane, please, stop. Stop treating me like we're…more than we are. I won't be your mistake."

"What do you mean, be my mistake?" Kurogane asked sharply.

The blonde smiled quietly, looking at his hand in his lap; "You know that night… When you told me you weren't strong enough for me?"

"Fai—I don't think you really understood what I was saying," the elder said quietly.

Fai shook his head, "It doesn't matter what it means, Kurogane. I'm not talking about that anyway. These girls came up to me, and—I—" His voice broke, and he gave a small tremble, "I—I saw the girl you were talking to, and… I…"

"You believed them," Kurogane sighed, dropping his head into his hands. He rubbed his temples in frustration, trying to restrain his urge to yell or snap at the blonde. "That girl you saw me talking to, her name is Kobato. You know Hikaru Shidou, right?"

"She's the freshman on the kendo team, she's really sweet and she's good, too, since her brother's are alumni of the team," Fai said flatly, "I don't understand what you're getting at."

"Kobato is friends with Hikaru, but Kobato's an absolute ditz—she wanted to support Hikaru since she was sad that they couldn't hang out that much. So she joined the team as a manager after you left," Kurogane said lightly. "Her boyfriend is a senior, that guy Fujimoto."

"What?"

"I'm saying that she's nothing but another member of the club, you idiot! Those girls saw an opportunity, and they took it to lie to you," the elder growled. It was startling, how angry he still was at those girls. As if he would magically fall in love with any of them because Fai was gone. "Look, she came to me with a problem about the club. Sya… A… a member was… He wasn't being normal. He was throwing things about and engaging in reckless behavior while I wasn't there. It's my fault as the captain that I didn't arrange for a substitute captain while I was suspended from club activities, but it's also my duty to deal with it. So she came to me, and was upset about it." Kurogane sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose, "Look, she wanted to go and apologize to you for taking my time to tell me," he said plaintively.

Fai paused and looked over at Kurogane, who was running his thumbs over his forehead in frustration. He clenched his fist shut once, then opened it. "Really?" he asked quietly, voice small. "…You didn't go to the dance with anyone?"

"Unless you count Tomoyo… please don't," Kurogane muttered.

The blonde laughed softly, surprising Kurogane entirely. He wondered how many more times Fai would laugh before it was no longer surprising, but something normal once again. "There's nothing wrong with Tomoyo-chan." Fai fidgeted, looking away from the elder; "Sorry… for… believing them."

"They told me," Kurogane said suddenly, voice hard, "What they said to you… Fai, what was it that made you break down?" He had to know what it had been exactly. It would drive him crazy otherwise, constantly wondering if it was his own words that broke the blonde down or another's. He held no sympathy for the girl he had frightened so badly, something that should have bothered him greatly, but for those who would harm the ones he loved, Kurogane saw no point in sparing them any amount of emotion. If he was the one who had caused Fai to withdraw so deeply… he didn't know what he could do to make it better.

Fai shook his head, "It doesn't matter; it was stupid. I should have known better. I'm supposed to know better. Even you think so."

Kurogane reached out and took Fai gently by the chin. He ran his thumb softly against the blonde's bruised cheek, shaking his head; "There are differences between knowing and believing; I don't mind if you have doubts… I just wish you'd tell me about them," he said. "So tell me."

The blonde's blue eyes briefly met Kurogane's before flitting away; he couldn't deny Kurogane when he looked like he did. It would never matter how many times he resisted, died, and was reborn—Fai couldn't bear to separate himself from the elder… so why was something that he must do?

"They're right…It would be better for all of you if I just disappeared," Fai whispered, taking Kurogane's hand as he dropped his head. He held the elder's palm against his cheek, his eyes closed against tears that threatened to overwhelm him. "For Kurogane, strength is so important, yet I force him to realize that he is not strong. To Sakura, being able to smile and be strong is all she feels she can do, yet I caused her to cry so many times. For Shaoran, his brother was his ally, his friend, his confidant, but because of my own failures, Shaoran no longer has a brother to turn to. Who knows what I have done to Kimihiro—he won't tell anyone his own sorrows, I doubt Doumeki even knows. I've burdened every person I love—" He was the living embodiment of Pandora's Box, and only disaster lay in wait for those who dared to broach him and open his heart. There was no hope at the bottom of his existence; Kurogane was only coming to him again and again in the hopes that something that didn't exist was sealed away in his soul.

"Except that meeting you has made me happy," Kurogane soothed quietly. He leaned forward and gently pressed his lips to the blonde's forehead. "You see, the thing about strength, I've come to discover… is that only when you realize you're weak, you become strong."

"That doesn't make any sense," Fai hiccupped. He felt Kurogane wind his free arm around his waist, and allowed the elder to draw him up to his knees. He knelt before the older teen, eyes closing as Kurogane slid the hand on his face down his neck to his shoulders, holding him steady as he pressed his face to the crook of Fai's neck. The blonde stared off over Kurogane's head once he opened his eyes again, the room swimming with tears. He looked into the light, willing them back; he didn't want to cry over everything. He, too, wanted to be stronger. Crying solved nothing.

Kurogane held onto Fai like the blonde would simply blow away without his strength; it was quite possible that he would, in fact, disappear if Kurogane didn't keep a strict eye on him. "Well," Kurogane murmured against Fai's neck, "Once you realize your weaknesses, then you can start doing something about them and stop running away every time you realize you can't do something."

"Kurogane, I don't—"

"And I know that Sakura and Watanuki both care about you very much," Kurogane continued over Fai's soft protest. "They'd hate to know that you're calling yourself bad luck."

"Kurogane, don't," Fai repeated, wrapping his arm around the elder. He dropped his face into the teen's hair, doing his best not to cry anymore. "I'm poisonous; I make people unhappy because I can't be happy. I don't mean to, I don't want to, but I can't help it—"

"Then how can I make you happy? What can we do? You need to stop with this 'I can't', and start thinking of the small things that you can do." It was something that was so obvious to Kurogane himself that it had taken him a long time to realize that Fai didn't know any better.

Fai shook his head, feeling overwhelmed by everything from the scent of Kurogane's hair against his cheek to the weight of the elder's body against his own; the wheedling tone in the elder's voice made his heart twist and leap into his throat and burned his eyes with tears. He gave in and let himself cry, body shaking with each breath he gasped in. "I don't know—I don't know—you've done so much already and still I can't—I don't know—"

Kurogane slid his hands against Fai's back soothingly. He knew what it felt like to be lost, to not know which path was the best. He knew, so painfully well, what it felt like to be a burden on the people you loved the most. He knew that lashing out and hurting others because you were afraid of their love brought only more pain in the end. "Fai, shhh…Listen to me: Stop looking so far ahead," he murmured, "Just focus on what you want to do right now… So, what do you want the most right now?"

"Am I allowed to do that?"

"Why wouldn't you be, Fai?" Kurogane scoffed, gently prodding Fai in his uninjured side. "What do you think I do all the time?"

The blonde gave a soft squirm and a shy, giggling hiccup at the attention, then slid from his knees to sit flat in Kurogane's lap. He held tightly onto the elder, hiding his face in Kurogane's shirt. "…I'd like to have cake," he said softly, "And go to live with you."

"Okay then," Kurogane murmured, reaching up to brush his fingers through Fai's bangs. He'd watched it grow out before his very eyes, in covert glances in the classroom and from across the hall, but it surprised him how long Fai had let his hair get. It was oddly suitable to the blonde, and of all things, it made him look older. It was strange to think that Fai was only a year younger than him, as the musician's tendencies made him simultaneously seem younger and older than anyone Kurogane knew. "We'll get you packed up, and settled into my place and after, we'll stop by Clover for dinner. I know you like their cakes the best," he told Fai calmly.

"Thank you," Fai whispered, fingers tightening around the material of Kurogane's shirt.

XxXxXxX

It had been easy enough to gather Fai's things; the blonde said seriously that all he truly needed was his guitar and a single change of clothes. Kurogane was troubled by the way Fai had so casually hinted that it would be easy for him to leave Koryo all together, though he did not comment—he already knew how easy it was, exactly, for Fai to disappear.

That was what he was afraid of the most, he realized. It wasn't that he was upset that he didn't rank among the list of things important enough to take with Fai, exactly. It was that Fai didn't consider that there would be people left behind that would miss him; with technology the way it was, it would be easy to move to the other side of the planet if the urge arose and still stay in contact. But Fai barely could keep a cellphone intact as it was, much less think about leaving a trail behind for people to find him.

"You know," Kurogane said casually as he swung Fai's backpack onto his shoulder, "It takes a true musician to think that all they would need is their instrument."

Fai laughed, shaking his head, "It's not that I'm a musician," he said; "It's just that, that's what would get me enough money to get started where-ever I would go. Whether I just sell it, or whether I use it to get me food. …It's actually very cold of me to think that way, I think."

Kurogane had to concede that perhaps, Fai was actually fairly practical. Maybe the blonde had already gone somewhere without telling any of them, somewhere where it was normal to calculate in advance what belongings could be quickly grabbed and turned into a way to live.

"How many times have you been in such a situation where you would have to think that way, Fai?" Kurogane asked, now tucking one of Fai's pillows under his arm as the blonde went through his loft, sweeping various pill bottles into a plastic bag as he went around turning off electrical odds and ends.

Fai tucked his bag full of medicine into the pocket of his jacket so his hand could be free to disconnect his alarm clock from the wall. "Well, after the first time, there's no need for a second. The terror of it is ingrained within you," he said quietly. "…Do you have everything I laid out for you?"

"Yeah. Fai… what happened to you before you came to Koryo?"

The blonde gave one of his apologetic half-smiles, shaking his head; "I came to Koryo," he said simply. He stepped forward towards the elder before leaning up onto his toes to press a soft kiss to Kurogane's cheek. "I came to Koryo with nothing but a name and fear."

Had his hands not been otherwise preoccupied with most of Fai's things, Kurogane would have held the younger boy close. The picture was clear in his mind, of a younger Fai alone in the loft apartment, the derelict rooms bare of furniture and the litter of everyday life: it was an image of a fourteen-year-old Fai that had only his music to comfort him when he woke in the middle of the night from his nightmares. It was lonely. It was sad.

Even he, who was so coarse and violently-tempered had Sonomi and Tomoyo and Ameterasu when his parents had died and his life had been turned upside-down. But before Fai met Sakura and Watanuki, he'd had no one. Not a single soul to comfort him. "You have a lot more now," Kurogane said softly.

Fai laughed, picking up a duffle bag from the floor. "I'd say. You'd be surprised how much junk you can collect when you work at Yuuko's shop," he teased lightly, avoiding Kurogane's eye.

"You know what I mean," the elder said seriously.

"Please don't; we've already had this discussion once today." Fai turned to look at Kurogane, frowning. He sighed; to do what he wanted was hard. "Just… don't. I know what you mean," he continued, shaking his head. He moved past the older boy, lips pursed. "But that doesn't mean that I want to think that way."

Kurogane followed after Fai, the blonde's outline becoming less and less distinct as Fai walked ahead of him, cutting off the lights as he went. "Why not? You're not alone anymore, wasn't that what you wanted?"

Fai paused with his hand on the last light switch in the apartment; Kurogane could tell from the blonde's silhouette that he was looking towards him, but he could not make out Fai's face in the half-light from the hallway. "I didn't know it would hurt this much," Fai answered simply, decisively plunging them into semi-darkness. "It seems like every time I think about how much I have, and how I'm thankful for it… I lose it."

"So it's easier to take it for granted?"

"No," Fai answered, shaking his head. "It's…more complicated than that." To him, taking something for granted was just as big of a sin as being thankful for it; both signified that there would one day be an end, that what he had was fleeting. Perhaps, in his own twisted way, his fear was being thankful for his friends. For having a roof over his head, for being free enough that he could walk and talk and sing, that he could go to sleep at night without being beaten and bruised, and that the view outside of his window was of sky and not dirt and roots and dingy concrete. But having these things hurt; because he hadn't had them in the past, because he wouldn't have them in the future; all that would change were the type of chains that bound him. His mouth would still be gagged, his movements and freedom would still be restrained. This brief moment of freedom was too painful to be truly thankful for, and too delightful to take for granted. "I think it would have been easier for me, in the end, if I hadn't gained more than I was willing to lose, you know?"

"I think everyone thinks that way," Kurogane replied, moving through the dark apartment to the door. "And the fact that you aren't willing to lose these things means you're thankful for them."

Fai laughed despite himself. "You certainly know how to twist my words to suit your own purposes, Kuro-sama."

"I learned from the best."

Fai pursed his lips, fingers curling into the hem of his shirt. He could tell by Kurogane's tone that he was only teasing, but the words still stung. They were true, of course, but it still hurt—The truth had a way of hurting in a way that not even the ugliest of lies could, he'd found.

Kurogane paused beside the blonde. He reached out and laid a hand on Fai's back, frowning; "You can't think like that all the time, that you're going to lose everything. Be thankful for it and enjoy what you have when you have it."

"But…Thinking like that… It's not an option for me," Fai said as he shrugged his dufflebag higher onto his shoulder. "Living in the moment is too much like taking things for granted to me."

"Taking something for granted isn't the same as living in the moment," Kurogane pointed out uneasily. "You know that right?"

"It is to me," Fai answered stubbornly. He looked down at his feet, clenching his teeth briefly before continuing; "I can't… not think about losing something. There's nothing in this world that's stable, always. Everything lives and dies and changes. Thoughts and feelings evolve just like nature does, and things change at the slightest provocation."

"But that… I won't say that's not true—it is, the world does change but—but, that's all in the future. That isn't tomorrow. That's years from now."

"Thinking like that is why Syaoron is dead!" He was shouting now without realizing it; this desperation was driving him mad. It was the worst feeling, knowing that everything would end but not knowing when or how. He felt like he was drowning, being buried alive by this feeling. He had to let someone know, anyone know; all of this could have been avoided. All of it. He couldn't let himself make the same mistakes again.

Kurogane flinched away in surprise, hand withdrawing from the blonde as if he'd been burned.

"You hear it all the time, don't you? About people who kill themselves, and everyone says they didn't know there was anything wrong until that person was already dead! Why do you think that happens, Kurogane, why do you think?!"

"I don't know—I… what are you trying to say?"

"It's because they were taken for granted! It was assumed that they would cheer up in another day or so, or time would make things better for them, or that they would be around to apologize to another day! And those next times piled up into days, weeks, even years until that person just couldn't stand it anymore! And then they die!"

Kurogane took a step back from the blonde, eyes sickly fastened on Fai as he continued to shout. The boy's shoulders tensed and arched forward, heaving with every word that poured out of his mouth. Fai's face was hidden by his hair and shadows, but what Kurogane could see of it was contorted angrily into something almost inhuman by the ambient light and the force of what he was saying. It frightened Kurogane, and it was something he wasn't ashamed to admit—this wasn't Fai. While he had come to terms with the fact that there were things that he did not—and probably would not—know about the boy, this was not in alignment with the Fai he knew. These words were ugly and they lacked the blonde's regular grace. "Fai," Kurogane said carefully, "Fai… who are you talking about?"

Fai looked at Kurogane in alarm, stepping backwards. He bumped up against the wall, his bag falling to the floor as his hand went back to brace himself unsteadily. "What do you mean?" he asked harshly, panting through his words.

Kurogane stepped forward, hands outstretched towards the blonde. "Who are you talking about?" he repeated slowly in a way he hoped wasn't accusatory, "Are you talking about him… Or are you talking about yourself?" He grabbed Fai's arms as gently as he could while still having a firm enough of a grip on the boy to keep him from lashing out. The terror in Fai's eyes as he pieced together his own words was unreal and visceral, and it startled Kurogane.

It was unnerving.

Fai's breath slowed from ragged breaths to shallow gasped to, finally, something more even; Kuroane held him fast, even when the blonde turned his head aside. "Fai," he said finally, "Tell me."

"I don't know."

The words came slowly, after a long moment of silence. They were quiet and reluctant but they rang with truth. Kurogane stepped away, fingers falling from the boy's arms. In their absence, Fai reached up and clung to Kurogane's shirt. In the darkness, Kurogane couldn't tell if Fai was silently sobbing or simply shaking. He held onto the slighter teen anyway, a familiar fear creeping deep into his bones.

They remained this way long after Fai had grown still and their arms became numb, until the relative quiet of the small apartment seeped into their chests and they became calm.

XxXxXxX

Clow slipped his fingers under his glasses and rubbed his eyes briefly before pinching the bridge of his nose. He sighed. Beside him, Kimihiro simply fidgeted, unable to keep himself still in his anxiety.

"I'm really sorry," Caldina said sadly, shaking her head as she slid Clow's drink across the bar. "I haven't seen 'em for weeks, really. Any of 'em, actually, 'cept these two here," she added, nodding towards Watanuki.

"Just keep an eye out for me, okay?" Clow asked, not really looking at the woman as he pressed his forehead to his palms, briefly acquiescing to frustration.

"Yeah, o' course I can," the waitress said firmly; "I'll give you a call, no issue."

Clow murmured his thanks, shifting himself upright once more to take a swig of his drink. "Any more ideas, Kimihiro?" he asked quietly, peering at his son from the corner of his eye.

"This is the last place I can really think of," Watanuki murmured quietly, rolling his fork between his fingers. "The Tavern isn't open, and there's no reason for them to go there anyway…"

"While I would normally say that it's nothing to really worry about," Clow said slowly, "I can't help but to be worried right now."

"Yeah." Watanuki echoed his guardian's earlier sigh, turning his head to the front of the store, where Doumeki could be seen on his phone just outside of the glass windows. "But, they're sure to be alright, right?"

Clow frowned slightly, "That's almost like a curse, Kimihiro," he said finally with a slight laugh.

Watanuki flinched, eyes wide; "Like jinxing them?! I don't—I didn't really mean—!"

"No, no, as far as curses go, I think that one is surely the best," Clow laughed, shaking his head. "They can't do anything bad knowing that you think that way. Those two are good kids."

The diner's bell jingled cheerily as Doumeki made his way back to the front bar, heaving himself into his seat with a sigh. He laid his phone down in front of him, shaking his head; "No one knows. I called Kurogane himself, since according to you, Fai never answers his phone."

"And?" Watanuki prompted, leaning towards the older boy.

"They're coming here for dinner," Doumeki said with a shrug. "I just said that no one knows, Kimihiro."

Watanuki punched Doumeki's arm half-heartedly, rather unwilling to admit that he had expected Kurogane to know something, despite the fact that he had been just as surprised as Fai to learn that Sakura and Shaoran had gone missing. It was an odd feeling, knowing that even those who were older than he was were helpless in this situation. "Well, Fai and Sakura-chan are close, so I thought, maybe…"

Doumeki simply reached out and took Watanuki's hand in his own, leaning back a little so he could look at Clow around the younger boy; "He said that they may not be where we think they would go, but rather where Syaoron himself liked to go," he continued.

"Well, that makes sense. I guess I'll go speak to their parents again and see if she's messaged them," Clow replied, standing. He handed Watanuki money for their meal, frowning thoughtfully; "Give those two my regards, and tell Fai that he needs to stop by the station later."

"Good luck," Watanuki replied somberly, despite the fact that he was trying to get Doumeki to relinquish his hold on his hand by shaking it fiercely.

"Oi."

Watanuki could have sworn he heard Doumeki snicker as he suddenly quit trying to shake the elder's hand off. He flushed, turning his head away from the archer; "What?!" he demanded stiffly.

"Let's move to a booth," he said simply. Doumeki dropped Watanuki's hand as he stood and picked up his plate, leaving Watnuki gaping and hurriedly explaining to Caldina where they were moving.

"You could just ask first," Watanuki whined, having caught up to the elder.

Doumeki shrugged, looking out the window idly; "Where do you think they went?"

Watanuki sighed, sliding into the booth next to his boyfriend. He arranged his plate and cup quietly, trying to align them just so with the edge of the table. He didn't know. He didn't want to think about it. Everything was falling apart, and he felt so empty and tired—he didn't want to be out even looking for them. He wanted to curl into Doumeki's side and just sleep. "I don't know," he whispered, feeling the familiar warm creep of tears inch up his throat; "I don't want to know."

Doumeki reached up and covered Watanuki's hand with his own, and this time, the younger didn't try to shake it off; "If you want to cry, that's fine."

"No it's not." Watanuki reached up and scrubbed at his eyes with his free hand; "How could they do that—I don't understand, don't they know that they're not the only ones who are hurt?!"

The archer remained silent as he squeezed Watanuki's hand, allowing the younger boy the time he needed to control himself again.

XxXxXxX

"I have to go."

Yukito looked up from his reading, frowning; "No, you don't," he said quietly. He laid his book down on the sheets, folding his hands in his lap as he surveyed his boyfriend's worried pacing.

Touya shook his head, turning mid-stride to move back towards his desk where his keys and jacket lay. "I have to go find her."

"You don't," Yukito repeated. "It won't help anything if you go out on a wild-goose chase for her."

"Yuki, I can't just sit here while she's missing and all that's left is some vague text message," the taller boy pleaded stubbornly. His hands hovered over his keys for a moment before he turned and resumed pacing back and forth. "I can't do anything. Damn."

"Come here, then." Yukito shifted slightly on the bed to make room for Touya; "The best thing you can do is wait here for her, while your parents are gone at the station. And when she comes back—"

"What if she doesn't," Touya retorted harshly, taking on a tone he never used on Yukito or his family, but rather reserved for customers who were acting out or those who had dared make his little sisters cry when they were younger. "What then?"

"Sakura-chan will come back," Yukito said serenely, barely bothered by Touya's temper. He'd long go accepted his boyfriend's helpless sister-complex, and he went along with it because he had a soft spot for Sakura himself. He could remember how Touya was before Tsubasa died, and remembered how much the boy had changed afterwards. He couldn't blame his boyfriend for flying into a restless fury whenever Sakura was in the slightest hint of danger. "She knows what that would do to you and your parents."

The dark-haired teen paused, glaring at his boyfriend for a long moment before sighing heavily. "You're right."

Yukito smiled softly despite his own worry. "Don't scold her too much when she comes back, either," he advised, "Let her know that you were worried and that she has a place to come back to even when she feels lost. Thank her for the message that she sent you, for telling you that she was at least safe."

Touya sat down beside Yukito as he shook his head; "They just make me so uneasy, though," he muttered, resting his head against the slighter boy's shoulder.

"Who, Sakura-chan and Shaoran?"

Touya made a noncommittal noise as Yukito slid his arms around him, face set into a worried frown. "Not just him… but the entire group… Maybe I'm just imagining things, but they all make me uneasy..."

XxXxXxX

"Do you mind going straight to Clover for dinner?"

Fai paused his idle humming, turning his gaze from the window of Kurogane's car to the elder, shaking his head. "There's nothing in my things that can't stay in the car," he said, "And I'm sort of hungry anyway."

"Sort of?" Kurogane laughed as he ruffled Fai's hair. To be honest, the blonde's earlier fit still left him highly unsettled; he had never seen the boy's personality shift so rapidly. Before, Fai's moods were slow, like the ebb and flow of the tide. He would slowly become less and less gregarious as he sank into the mire of his darkness, until all that was left were short tempered screams and sobs.

"I'm looking more forward to cake than food," Fai laughed, ducking away from Kurogane's hand.

"Idiot," Kurogane muttered fondly, turning his attention from Fai to driving to the diner.

Fai went back to looking out the window, pulling one knee up to his chest. Normally, it was just as easy to stay silent with Kurogane as it was to scream and yell and cry. Kurogane made things easier, more bearable—for that, Fai was thankful. But now he was struck with a sense of urgency that he couldn't quite form into words that weren't harsh and poisonous. He laid his head against the glass, the streets blurring past the corners of his eyes; "Kuro-sama, I'm sorry," he murmured slowly, once the scenery and silence had welled up within him until he could no longer stand it.

"There's nothing for you to be sorry for," Kurogane answered gruffly, glancing at the blonde from the corner of his eyes.

"But it sounded like I was blaming you… And I know you cared for him; it wasn't what I meant to say," Fai said mournfully. He closed his eyes, unwilling to meet Kurogane's eyes or even look at the man. "I just… I'm sorry."

"I cornered you, and you retaliated, that's all," Kurogane said softly. "But, Fai… You're not alone anymore."

Fai didn't answer, but instead resumed humming. Loving Kurogane was his greatest sin, the one indulgence that he bought with the expense of his own heart. He could feel the end coming in his bones, but he could not bear to give up Kurogane—not now that he'd finally admitted to himself how much it terrified him to be without the man. He couldn't ask that Kurogane give up everything with the vain hope that he could bring the man with him when the end came. It was far too selfish.

Kurogane reached out and laid a hand on Fai's shoulder, knowing that the blonde's silence held more than just a refusal to answer. Whatever it was that had Fai so terrified, he would stand by the boy, and he would be strong enough to protect him. Slowly, the quiet song that Fai hummed became words that became a song. The words came in broken verses interspersed with simple vocalizations when the words wouldn't come.

"…Daylight dies,
Black out the sky—
Does anyone care?
Is anybody there?
Take this life— empty inside,
I'm already dead:
I'll rise to fall again…
I can feel you falling away,
No longer the lost, no longer the same—
And I can see you starting to break—
I'll keep you alive
If you show me the way
Forever and ever
The scars will remain…"

The first time Kurogane had ever heard Fai compose had been before they were even dating, in the time between meeting and their first date. The blonde had offered to teach him guitar then, and when Kurogane thought back to that moment, he recognized it as the moment that Fai had put him completely under his spell. Since that day last December, Kurogane had heard the beginnings of hundreds of songs, from the beginning when they were just a phrase the blonde had whispered over and over in his sleep or a idle brush against the guitar to heated instructions and a flurry of Xeroxed sheet music to the point where Fai would step up on stage and pour his soul into the music. Each song was a fragment of the blonde's heart; Kurogane imagined that if he gathered them all, every melodic whisper and furiously scratched-in note, he could put them into place and understand everything that was Fai's.

Kurogane had long resigned himself to the fact that he was not the one who knew Fai the most intimately—he could trace his fingers over every arch and dip of the blonde's body, cover him with kisses and make love to him until the world ended, he could speak until his voice went hoarse with the truth, and he could chase after the blonde until his legs wore away, but he would not be the one who knew all of what made Fai Fai.

It hurt to know this, but he'd decided not to push it; when Fai wanted him to know, Fai would let him know. And Fai's songs did just that. They were the scattered feathers of a bird taken far beyond its limits; if gathered and sought after, they would eventually lead to the whole.

Kurogane swept his thumb over Fai's shoulder softly, waiting until the melody of his voice quieted. "Fai, I won't die, I promise," he said finally.

Fai looked up at Kurogane, noticing for the first time that between their conversation and his song, they had arrived at Clover. "Kuro-sama," he murmured, "People die easily… It's hard to stay alive… Don't promise that unless—unless you're willing to live."

"I will live for you," Kurogane promised as his face settled into a bemused scowl.

"Kurogane," Fai said after a long moment, looking towards the diner where his friends sat. "There's a lot I've lied about."

"I know."

"I've lied to you."

"I know. But I don't think you would involve yourself with me lightly."

"…would you accept everything I tell you? Would you?"

"I would."

Fai frowned and met Kurogane's gaze, his uninjured hand coming to rest on the elder's cheek; "Even if it meant that you would have to leave your strength and your life behind?"

Kurogane put his hand over Fai's; "Strength isn't something you can leave behind. I made up my mind a long time ago, you know, just where I chose to make my life—with you."

Fai leaned forward and gently kissed the elder; "I still think you're a fool for not running when you could… but that's what I love the most, I think," he laughed shyly as he pulled away.

Kurogane reached out and pulled Fai into another kiss, letting Fai's hand fall from his cheek to his shirt. "I may be a fool, but what are you?" he asked teasingly, finally relinquishing the blonde.

Fai slipped out of the car, smiling to himself as he waited for Kurogane to follow him. He kicked his heels against the curb, leaning against a parking meter. "Just the run-of-the-mill idiot," he chuckled, "That's me."

Kurogane clicked his tongue in slight scorn—Fai was anything but 'run-of-the-mill', but he kept his thoughts to himself as he fed his change into the meter. "Just an idiot, huh?"

"You're not supposed to agree with me!" Fai wailed in mock indignation, slipping his arm through Kurogane's.

"I don't lie, either," Kurogane replied in his normal blunt fashion, rolling his eyes as he dragged Fai along with him into the restaurant. With that one simple conversation, they'd managed to build a bridge together. And things changed.

They found Watanuki easily in the small diner, and ordered their meal as if nothing was wrong with the world around them. The only mentions of their current situation came in quiet fretting over Fai's ever-darkening bruises and how red his eyes were from crying.

Kurogane watched uneasily as Watanuki and Fai laughed and joked like they normally did. At one point, he drew his eyes from Fai long enough to meet Doumeki's gaze, his own expression mirrored on the archer's face.

Finally, the end came. They could not pretend forever, even though both Watanuki and Fai were so skilled in the subtleties of avoiding their own pain.

"Fai… Clow said that you needed to stop by the station," Watanuki murmured as Fai worked at demolishing the huge piece of cake that Kurogane had promised him earlier.

Fai paused, face contorting slightly in pain. The chocolate in his mouth soured, and he could barely bring himself to swallow it past the lump in his throat. "Oh. Now?"

"No, I… I think he's busy right now. But… it's about your accident."

"… I see," the blonde said quietly, setting his fork down on his plate. He dropped his eyes, suddenly very interested in the whorls of the wooden table. He had hoped that the conversation would not drift towards this subject that was so close to Syaoron's death. He did not want to think about it. He did not even want to acknowledge that it had occurred. It chilled him thoroughly, to think that he was so close to having caused this sort of pain himself. It made him sick. It made him angry.

Watanuki fidgeted, hands twisting at his napkin in his lap. "Fai, are you okay?" He had to know; it was selfish, but if the answer was anything but yes… he couldn't cope with it. It was too much pain, it was too many tears.

"No," Fai said flatly, "But neither are you. But that's why we have to do our best when Sakura-chan comes back."

XxXxXxX

How had it gotten to this point? Koryo was supposed to be a quiet town; a safe town. In all of his years of being a detective and an officer , Clow had never known it to be anything but the sleepy haven of suburbia it had been when he and his wife had decided to settle down from their previous "occupations".

But slowly, bit by bit, the sleepy town awoke. Its most jealously guarded secrets had begun to stir a little over a decade ago when two of his dearest friends had disappeared without a trace, leaving their young son behind. They had worked with them in his previous life, back when his own prowess for making people disappear into everyday life had him renowned as an almost-magician. He had thought that the programmer and his wife had found a better, and safer, life in Koryo as employees of a then-expanding toy company headed by two of the town's citizens—and while the police had officially ruled their disappearance as a freak accident, Clow knew better.

So he and Yuuko had fought to adopt their son in the absence of a concrete will and their bodies. They knew the true reason why Kimihiro's name did not match his parent's, and he was grateful that his son had never asked. It was a truth that was just too big for words and a truth that would endanger them all.

He had hoped that their disappearance would be the end of it; but years later, the Suwas were murdered in their home. Their son had been forced to watch. Zima and Dita Suwa ran the very same company that Minoru had worked for all those years ago. The weight of the murder had doubled in meaning by that one simple fact.

Clow knew a conspiracy when he saw one. He knew the feel of it, the sight of it, and he knew just which strings to pull to make sure that the young Suwa boy did not know the details of what had happened to his parents' killer: It was kinder, in a strange, sick, and twisted way to let him think that his one strike with a pipe had killed the man than to let him know about the web of lies and schemes his life had suddenly become ensnared in. He had taken the boy into his care and kept a careful eye over Koryo ever since that night, carefully dipping his fingers back into a world he thought he'd left behind.

Something was brewing in the sleepy town bordered by desert sands, and Clow did not like it one bit. Involving innocent children in adult affairs that were better kept in the dark did not bode well with his conscience. And so, under his and Yuuko's careful watch, Koryo had once again slept. He'd made sure of it—with both Kimihiro and Kurogane under his and Yuuko's careful eyes, the danger lessened.

And then he'd gotten the call— it was the call he'd dreaded he would get the moment that Minoru and Yuzuki had vanished into thin air. He was needed. His wife was needed. It was the reason why that surprised him:

They were to do nothing more but watch and gather information, and make occasional reports regarding the safety of the boy that was moving to Koryo. He was young, the same age as the son they had adopted in the wake of the first stirrings of the town's secrets, but troubled far beyond his age. He was manic, he was fatalistic, and he needed to be kept in check.

Clow was going to refuse, but he saw it. He could see the pattern to it, the web of fate that connected that boy to his son to the Suwa boy, and could see how, just maybe, a quiet life could change that pattern for the better. It was time for him to once again work his own magic from the shadows.

He sighed, his breath billowing out in front of him like smoke only to be whipped away by the night wind. He was tired; he'd been up for longer than forty-eight hours now, but at least things were settling down in Koryo once again.

"So why did you call me here, of all places, Reed?"

Clow turned at the sound of Ohjiro Mihara's rather irritated voice; he hadn't heard the rather cumbersome door open due to the white noise caused by the night wind. He smiled, leaning back against the concrete barrier at the edge of the room, "Because no one would think twice about another couple of visitors in such a place. This is the only hospital for two towns; people come and go as they please," he answered.

"I have my own job to attend to; I can't go running around catering to your wills as well," the younger man said with a scowl, letting the metal door slam behind him as he stalked up to the small bench a few feet from where Clow stood. "So why did you ask me here?"

"Why do you think?" Clow asked amiably as he moved to settle next to Ohjiro.

The man sighed, dropping his head into his hands to rub his temples exasperatedly. "That boy."

"That child has a name."

Ohjiro shot Clow a scathing look at the gentle castigation, then leaned back, head tipped back over the edge of the bench. "He has several. His favorite to use is Fai, spelling pending." He closed his eyes, dreading the conversation that was to come.

"Surely you've figured out by now that I'm not as retired as I once was," Clow said lightly, "So I'll ask you this: What is the situation?"

And there it was. Once again he was nothing but a second-rate at his job, the thing he loved doing more than anything. Except… maybe now he wasn't quite as fond of it as he had once been. "There's not officially a situation yet. As far as my superiors know, he's still safe. I kept my promise to him at the cost of his life and heart."

"It's not wrong to want to make him happy."

The soft reminder was almost whipped away in the wind and the sound of the rooftop garden's rustling. Ohjiro reached into his coat pocket at pulled out a cigarette, idly putting it to his lips without lighting it. "I assume you want to know the unofficial situation, then?" he continued without prompt.

"Of course," Clow replied easily, "I want to know what exactly was brought upon my town by his arrival and why it was so necessary to draw myself and my wife out of our new lives to deal with it."

"He asked to leave the safehouse," Ohjiro answered, finally pulling himself back into a sitting position. He lit his cigarette after a moment of fumbling with his lighter, drawing in a long breath before sighing. "…We didn't think we were locking him up in a new, gilded cage… he just wasn't allowed free reign. Someone was always with him—we always knew where he was, what he was doing if he left our sight… You see… For a long time he wasn't able to go outside or interact with people without breaking down into fits. He couldn't adapt. So he was isolated for a while, and slowly introduced to his new life in bits and pieces. He got moved around a lot; we couldn't find a stable place for him to live, and it was hard on him, the endless rotations of foster homes.

"He couldn't handle it, and in the end, he wound up in the hospital. One of our newer agents came into contact with him, and she adored him—she begged me to let her take care of him. We let her, even though she had no training in our protocol and had never been a foster parent before. She was the only one besides me who ever got a reaction out of him when he was in one of his relapses and he was mute, you know? Of course we bloody let her!" Ohjiro shook his head in frustration as he held back a sigh.

"Anyway," he continued, "It was a slow transition: First it was just the two of us in that house we'd provided for them, and then once Fai had become accustomed to it, Misaki moved in. She began to homeschool him, and I would leave the two of them for a while, until I was able to come and go without him being triggered. After that, she would let him go outside and play until it was safe for him to walk around the block with her. Slowly, we normalized his life."

"And he asked to leave?"

"We worked hard, Misaki and I, to give him a place that was safe. He says we locked him up lik his father did… But we tried so hard to keep him safe, but give him something normal… He had choices—we always let him chose the smallest things, because we'd taken away so many of the big ones," the younger man said in frustration, cigarette shaking between his fingers. "I used to think—how could someone do that to a child? How an adult could look a child in their eyes and take away their childhood and innocence, and the choice saved for the person they loved the most…It's beyond me. And as Yu…Fai grew older, I realized that I… I was just as bad as his father had been."

"We'd kept him caged up like some ornamental bird, for our own purposes. We weren't normalizing him so that he could grow up and lead a fairly ordinary life, but because we needed him slightly sane for the courts. We weren't keeping him away from other children because he couldn't handle it, but because we were afraid that our cover would be blown. I couldn't deal with that sort of revelation. I handed his care completely over to Misaki." Ohjiro shook his head, and drew a long breath. He closed his eyes in thought, obviously lost in the memories.

Clow gave a noncommittal murmur to show that he was still listening, still interested in the story, but Ohjiro remained silent. "And then?" he prompted.

"We moved him once afterwards, to a larger city where one more troubled youth wouldn't make too much of a difference, where he could blend into the background even if he happened to break down. We enrolled him in school in the hopes that he'd make friends, and live more than the hollow half-life we'd placed him in… But it was too late for that. Maybe it was because of being moved so much when he was younger, or maybe he sensed our guilt, but he saw it as a punishment. That he'd done something wrong, so we'd moved him again—uprooting Misaki's life with his own."

"You see, around that time, Misaki had begun to date one of the agency's trainers, a martial artist named Koutarou… he couldn't come with us when we moved. Not right away, at least. Fai picked up on the fact that Misaki missed him, and while she would never dream of blaming him, that child has never had any qualms at blaming himself for things he wasn't responsible for."

"So what happened?" Clow asked, puzzled. The Fai that he knew was troubled, yes, but he was far from the isolated boy that Ohjiro was describing.

"He went to school, distanced himself from Misaki and from myself when I visited. He'd always had a special gift for music, ever since he'd first entered our program… His father had taught him piano, he said. His mother had taught him to sing. He picked up the violin in his first foster home, after hearing someone play it on a crowded street corner on the way home from court. The only thing he ever asked of us was safety and music. I've bought him instruments, manuals, drafting books, strings, tuners… Anything he asked for. We moved him to Jade in the winter; the snow made him so cold that he would not even move his fingers to play the piano we'd brought along. He would not pick up his bow. He withdrew. He made no friends."

"One day, he came tearing out of his room, a wild look in his eyes," Ohjiro murmured, snuffing out his cigarette on the edge of the bench. He slipped the butt of it back into the small box in his lap, eyes sliding shut. Clow knew the memory was playing behind his eyes, better recorded than any home movie in the younger man's mind. "I'd come for tea with Misaki, who'd called me near in tears because her beloved Fai would not talk to her anymore. He raced down the stairs so quickly that we thought the devil himself was after him. He ran straight into her lap, and threw his arms around her and begged for a trip to the music store."

"What was he after?" Clow laughed, having experienced a few scenes like that between himself and Watanuki. He was more easily beguiled into trips and treats than his wife, and so Kimihiro came to him the most.

"A guitar. He'd heard a song on the radio that he'd liked so much that he decided he had to learn how to play the guitar. That's when we realized that his mania went farther than sheer stubbornness. We let him have it, we let him ignore the rest of the world for a long time, and we continued as we always had. …I thought it was as close to a life he would have, you know? I thought we'd chosen a safe place for him, but… the letters started coming."

"…From his father?"

"Yeah. At first they were small things. Threats. Or pictures from the newspapers from the trial. Little bits and pieces from his old life. Misaki and I kept them far away from Fai. We started preparing for the worse, prepping everything for another move. One day Misaki got hurt—one of the letters had been addressed to her and not Fai, and she opened it without thinking. It had razors in it; it was petty and juvenile, but it was enough to make Fai notice."

Clow watched as Ohijro folded his hands together in his lap, eyes opening slowly to the sky above them. "Surely, knowing that man… he knew that his letters weren't reaching his son because of us, so he sent something to draw the boy out. Even now, he's doing the same thing."

"The calls?"

"From relatives, from himself. Slowly, so that he wears down and breaks again. I don't know what his plan is, but he knows how to get his son's attention."

"But what about the woman who was taking care of him, Misaki?"

"It was nothing big," Ohjiro repeated quietly, shaking his head, "Nothing lasting. She didn't even scar; but Fai found out, and he went and looked for the letters. He waited for the next one… He blamed himself, and…"

"He was angry, wasn't he?"

"I'd never seen him so livid in my life," the younger man whispered, falling still. "It put every other fit he'd ever had to shame. I never knew someone so small could be angry like that. He screamed and cried and threw things. He made himself sick from screaming. To this day… I don't know who he was more angry at—us, for keeping this from him; his father, for sending them… or himself… for simply being born. That's why when he asked us… When he asked to leave, I let him."

Clow bent forward and picked up the water-bottle he'd set down next to the base of their bench, the crackle of plastic cutting through the tense silence between them. He could see it in his mind's eye—he'd dealt with children so angry at the world for having been born that they seemed to swell twice their size in their fury, screaming curses and insults so that they could feel the retribution they felt they deserved. It was a trick for the helpless, a pleading cry for help. Perhaps what Fai had needed at that point was not the liberty that he thought he wanted, but rather a pair of arms to wrap themselves around his body and hold him close and safe. "When he asked to leave, what did he say?"

"He told Misaki that he was sorry he'd kept her and Koutarou from being married, and that she didn't have to watch over him anymore… but to me? …He said he'd had enough of running away from his father. That we hadn't kept him safe like we'd promised, and he was tired of the half-life we'd offered him in return. I begged him for another chance; I told him what I tell him now, that people need him… That he is the only one who can stop his father. He doesn't care, he just wants an end. …He doesn't know… how far it goes. He doesn't know how much he can change… or he doesn't care."

"And how far does this go?" Clow asked, unscrewing the lid from his water. He watched as Ohjiro shifted nervously, obviously uncomfortable with the question. He handed the bottle to the other man, watching him as he drank deeply in appreciation. "Ohijro, you owe me an explanation, at the least. Tell me how far this goes," he pressed again. "Tell me what you've gotten my family involved in."

Finally, Ohjiro answered, voice barely audible: "…Tell me, have you ever heard of Infinity?"

XxXxXxX

Sakura tossed her shoes aside. The sand was cold and damp against her feet, but it was better than getting it in her socks and finding sand for months afterwards. In her pocket, her cell phone felt like a burning stone, an act of betrayal. "Shaoran-kun," she said sadly, walking up to where her boyfriend sat. Around them, the wind blew and whipped the waves into foam. The air around her was icy, and Sakura was thankful for the coat she had over her shoulders. She had woken up with it tucked over her body in the car, with Shaoran gone and the ocean waves echoing around her.

Shaoran looked at her briefly, then back at the horizon. He sat with his arms around his knees, as if he were protecting himself from something. But the worst blow had already been delivered, and no shield could have kept it away. He was simply keeping the wound from growing larger, from letting his life seep out of him in waves of grief and anger. "I can't go any further," he said finally. "This was it."

"Even if we could go farther, we wouldn't be able to find them," Sakura said quietly. "Don't chase after a reality that can't exist anymore, Shaoran-kun."

"What else am I supposed to do—?! They're gone and the one thing we could have stopped, we didn't!" Shaoran brought his fist down into the sand in anger.

Sakura slid down to sit beside the boy, tucking a strand of her hair behind her ear before it blew back into her face. "…Fuuka wouldn't want us to be sad," she murmured. "Or blame ourselves. It's so twisted, the way everything turned out and fell apart, but he… that's what made him the happiest. That's what he chose to do."

"So you're content in letting them go, living the rest of your life in Koryo without them?"

Sakura sighed, shaking her head, "Being just content wouldn't satisfy me. Shaoran-kun, I'm tired of being in mourning, not letting them rest… What would they say if they saw us like this? I'm tired, and I want to be happy. Not just for me, but I want to be happy enough for Tsubasa and Fuuka too, even if it means that I have to be punished one day." She fell silent, choosing not to continue until after her companion's tears had eased. She leaned gently against Shaoran, closing her eyes. "Surely Shaoran-kun wants to be happy for Fuuka too, right?"

Shaoran brought his hands from the sand, streams of it flowing out from his fists. He opened his fingers and stared out at his palms; "I never realized how much he suffered. Because of my own selfishness… Not only him, but you too," he said in anguish, eyes closing against a fresh wave of tears. He wished the pounding behind his eyes would stop and the tears would cease, that someone—anyone—could take mercy upon his being and simply rip his heart from his chest. But he was all that remained of his brother, the other half of his existence—the only proof that a boy named Syaoron had existed in the world—then he could not die. Perhaps it would be kinder then for him to lose his soul, his consciousness, the one thing in his body that caused him to recognize this pain. "By the time I noticed, it was too late—too late… I would give anything to fix my own mistake. Maybe I don't deserve to be happy like that."

Sakura wrapped her arms tightly around Shaoran, shaking her head against his shoulder; "I don't care!" she cried finally, tears spilling down her face and soaking into the boy's shirt; "I don't—even if what you did, even if being born and living was a sin, I will bear it with you! Shaoran-kun—Shaoran-kun—if I could live the rest of my life with you, then I will bear any sin you have ever committed, it would make me glad to be punished, if only I could be with you always!" She gave a loud, trembling sob, fingers tight in Shaoran's shirt. "But if Shaoran-kun isn't happy, then it's worthless! I would do anything if it meant that you would find your own happiness!"

It was a long time before Shaoran folded his hands around Sakura's, their fingers cold and trembling against the other's. When they looked back on that one moment, it was hard for them to say if that had been the moment they had decided to grow past their sorrows and guilt, or if it had been a decision that had been slowly growing in the back of their minds: one that had been unfurling itself in their hearts like a flower growing from the snow, their intertwined fingers the first moment that color had burst from the frozen bud.

Although Sakura knew that Shaoran had chosen to restart his life beside her, she knew that what had been broken would never be completely fixed. It would take a long time for Shaoran to get over this pain—it would take her a while too—but the decision to live and to be happy didn't necessarily mean forgetting. She knew that the past would always haunt the boy she loved, just as it would always creep up beside her in the night. But she was okay with that, for the price of forgetting that past would be far more painful than the memories themselves. "It may be hard," she whispered, shivering in the cold breeze only once before Shaoran turned and drew her tightly into his chest.

"It doesn't matter; I promise I'll make you happy," Shaoran muttered stubbornly, causing Sakura to give her first smile in what felt like ages.

And so they sat in silence, simply holding onto each other as the waves crashed around them, the slowly rising tide the only indication that the world still turned after the choice that they had made together. Once the ocean began to lap at their feet, they stood, fingers still tightly clasped between them.

"I let nii-chan know where we were," Sakura said softly as they plodded their way up the beach and back to the car. "Before I came out to see you."

Shaoran nodded quietly, giving the girl's hand a soft squeeze; "I figured you had," he said quietly. "…Or actually, I had hoped you did."

"What do you mean?"

"Telling Touya-san where you are decreases the odds that I'll be murdered in cold blood for taking you off somewhere without his knowledge," Shaoran said, completely serious.

Sakura blinked, then shook her head, peals of helpless laughter echoing through the air. "Onii-chan wouldn't actually hurt you!" she giggled, though she wondered if that were entirely true for this particular transgression. She watched as Shaoran's face shifted from surprised, to guilty, then to a quiet smile that spoke of both intense sadness and relief. She felt the same momentary grief at finding herself suddenly so light hearted. She dropped her eyes to her feet and wiggled her toes; the look on Shaoran's face made her heart break with the love she held for him and reminded her that he had the exact same feelings for her as well. "…In any case, he didn't sound mad."

"That's good, then," Shaoran said lightly, "Because I don't really have an excuse for myself this time."

"I'm the one who went along," Sakura said, obviously pouting now. The boy beside her gave a soft chuckle and pushed her gently towards the passenger side of the car, finally relinquishing her hand.

"Not that your brother could ever see that past his complex," he said with a leer. "It's a wonder that Tsukishiro even can tolerate it."

Sakura met his eyes and even though that same quiet sadness was still there in his mismatched eyes, it felt like a weight had been lifted from both of their hearts. She launched herself at her childhood friend and boyfriend and the one she loved above even her own self and awarded him a delighted and shy kiss.

Perhaps, she thought, this was what Syaoron had wanted most of all: to set the four of them free. It would take time, and the grief would never be gone… but maybe now, they were finally free.

XxXxXxX

Kurogane's apartment turned out to be a two-level townhouse. A small home carved in between families and college students in a not-quite new, but not ancient, development. It was even a gated community—a card and a code were required to gain entrance. There was even a little guardhouse with an actual guard, whom Kurogane awkwardly introduced Fai to so he could be granted entrance into the 'community'. There were woods. There was a small retention pond that had been dolled up into a lake. Ducks. Familes. It was a five minute walk to the high school, and only a five minute drive to get to Koryo's main square. It astonished Fai—he hadn't expected something like this from the elder.

It took him a moment to remember that horrible fight they'd had back in August: Kurogane was, in fact, a rich kid.

In any case, this was not an apartment, or even somewhere to simply eke out a life between school and meals— this was a home. A place that was built, designed, painted, and meant to be made into a home. And Kurogane wanted him there. It was terrifying and infinitely flattering.

"Kurogane, this… this is…" Fai breathed, kicking his shoes off at the small entryway. Next to him, was an opening to the small, cozy kitchen; the wide living room area opened up before him.

It was arranged differently and sized differently, but the color schemes, the furniture, even the feel was infinitely the same. He felt a dizzying sense of déjà vu, feeling so at home in a place as warm and comforting as this. It seemed as if Kurogane carried home with him. Fai was convinced that no one but himself understood this—no matter where Kurogane was, that was home for Fai.

Kurogane rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly, nudging Fai's shoes out of his way with his toe. "…It's a bit big for me," he admitted, glaring out at the back door that led to a small concrete porch and backyard with ample trees and shrubbery. Perfect for a dog or cat, Tomoyo pointed out when they'd toured the 'apartment', or even for nighttime dinners or small parties or meteor showers (Kurogane had to shut her up at this point, having been sickened by the possibilities that could have been his life with Fai here).

"A bit?" Fai mumbled, still feeling slightly overwhelmed at just how at home he felt, even though he was just a guest.

"It's only two bedrooms," Kurogane was quick to point out, feeling like he was suddenly being judged for a crime he hadn't been aware of committing. "…I know you… you don't really… you're not fond of money," he muttered, "But Sonomi insisted that we… live in a more home-like place."

"Only my father's money," Fai reminded Kurogane gently. He tentatively padded past Kurogane onto the carpeted floor of the living area, looking around. There were the mind teaser puzzles he fidgeted with when he couldn't sleep. He could remember fiddling with them in the dark on the sofa, lips pursed in concentration. He could never quite solve them; Kurogane always woke before he could fit that last piece into place. The elder would creep behind him, strong arms winding around his shoulders gently. He would lean forward and press his nose to Fai's hair and cover the blonde's hands with his own, helping him turn the last few corners until the puzzle was completed. 'Come back to bed,' he'd whisper. A shiver ran up Fai's back at the memory.

There was the photo collection. Without a mantle, they had been hung on walls with such precision that Fai knew that Tomoyo had once again been Kurogane's decorator. Pictures of his parents, himself, his team… Some were familiar and old to Fai. Some were new. A picture of him with Tomoyo and Ameterasu. One of him with Clow. A shot that had to be candid—Fai never knew it even existed—of him and the rest of the Gothix at practice. There were even a few of him with Kurogane. Laughing. Smiling. A few candid pictures of them holding hands, or with Kurogane and Sakura laughing, with him and Shaoran glaring. Of Watanuki shouting with Fai. Their life, neat, in frames on Kurogane's wall. Immortalized.

Proof, at last, that what Fai had in Koryo was real. "When… when did you get these?"

"They were Tomoyo's housewarming present," Kurogane said from behind him. He gently tapped the glass of the central picture, of the both of them lounging on the beach together, hands and arms entwined, asleep. Their heads were perfectly rested against the other, soft half-smiles playing across their lips. "This is my favorite one. She'd been sneaking pictures for ages, hoarding them from her own collection… or Sakura's, in this case."

"Sakura-chan took this one?"

"Yeah. So in a way, it was her gift too."

Fai paused, turning to look at Kurogane quizzically. The elder was staring at the collection with a sort of sad look of half-longing, and Fai was struck suddenly with the realization that Kurogane was lonely. He'd been all alone in a new apartment that was made to become a home, with only pictures to keep him company. "Kuro-sama," he said softly, "I… I may stay longer than a week."

Kurogane smirked softly, "We'll see." He reached out and mussed Fai's hair, careful of the various bruises and bandages that seemingly held the blonde together.

Fai smiled back shyly, feeling his cheeks flush.

"Come on, I'll show you the upstairs," Kurogane said, hand trailing softly from Fai's hair to the back of his neck, where his fingers rested briefly. He rubbed his thumb against the soft skin at the nape of Fai's neck once, then pulled his hand away, moving past the sitting area to the back of the townhouse only a few steps away. "Both of the bedrooms are upstairs. There's a half-bath right there," he informed the musician, pointing to a door a few feet from the entryway; "But the shower and stuff is upstairs."

Fai shuffled along behind Kurogane, toes digging into the soft carpet. He trudged off the stairs, peering both ways down a small hallway landing. Two doors rest on either side of the landing, with one in the middle. He looked around Kurogane into the room that was open, revealing Kurogane's room. It was still decorated in the same colors, the same sheets… It was dizzyingly like the room in the apartment they had left. But the bed was in a different place. The desk was in the wrong corner… But it was the same. It also happened to be a wreck. "So Kuro-sama doesn't clean without me?"

Kurogane flushed and stepped between Fai and the view to his room. "Er—I've been busy lately," he grumbled, reaching out to put his hands on Fai's shoulders. He turned the boy, and pushed him towards the other door at the end of the landing. "That way's the guest room—your room," he added hesitantly, the last words forming an almost question.

Fai swallowed, hearing the words that he knew Kurogane's heart was screaming—the elder was begging him silently, please stay, please stay!. Fai reached forward at the doorway, hand hovering over the knob. He closed his fingers around the cold metal and pushed the door open.

This room was different. It was decorated in rich plum and cream, a set that he vaguely remembered that Kurogane had received from Tomoyo the Christmas they had started dating. Kurogane never used it, even though Fai had later found it and wanted to. Kurogane had set it away, grumbling about how he didn't understand why Tomoyo kept getting him things in fancy colors—black was fine for décor— and that he'd put it to use later, for a better occasion than just because it looked pretty to someone. Perhaps when his own sheets fell apart.

The blonde stepped forward, settling himself onto the bed. He looked around, noticing small things like the boxes in the closet, carefully taped away and labeled "Fai's" and "Winter" in Tomoyo's very precise script. Yes. It fit for him to be packed away with the winter things: He was cold and bitter and dead like winter.

He looked to Kurogane, who stood in the doorway with a pensive, blazing expression. If Fai was winter, Kurogane was spring, where things flourished under sudden heat, its touches bringing even the deadest of nature back to life. How else could it be that Fai came with every intention of never staying, yet after only ten minutes in the small house, he felt like he was home and never wanted to leave?

Maybe my winter can melt, Fai thought.

"I love it," he said, face alight. He meant it.

---

A/N: There really was no way to trim down the whole 'thirty pages that only spans a day and a half' nonsense that went down in here. So it goes, I guess.

"Castle of Glass"- Linkin Park
"Give Me a Sign"- Breaking Benjamin