+++ COMPLICATION: Family Ties (also known as crime and punishment).

If my mistress had foreseen that moment, yet failed to inform me ahead of time, then she was crueler than I had previously speculated.

I had no intention of being there. I had no intention of staying.

But, I did.

By some star-forsaken curse, I seemed unable, or unwilling, to leave my chair.

A very nice chair it was, might I add, polished mahogany accented in delicately carved trim and a soft scarlet pillow seat. The nice, yet cursed, chair matched a table I was sitting at, along with the seat's twin on the other side. The one that just so happened to occupy my twin. Between us, an expensive and fragile-looking tea set beaconed from the center of the table.

Sasarai was periodically nursing the liquid in his cup while I had allowed mine to grow cold.

Not that I would have had a chance to drink it anyhow with these incessant questions...

"Leknaat still provides astrological guidance for Toran?"

I did not bother to look at him; I had felt his eyes on me even when I stared at myself reflected in the dark beverage.

"She stopped after the Gate Rune war." You might have known that if you actually concerned yourself with something other than your kingdom. A rare occurrence of tact possessed me and my thoughts remained unspoken.

He must have nodded, I assumed, and took a sip of tea before he stated plainly, "I see."

A few minutes drew by in silence. Finally ... I raised the teacup to my lips only to set it back down, wrinkling my nose at its temperature. Instead, I passed the time intriguing myself with the grains in the wooden table.

After a few seconds, my patience gave out and I turned my gaze to him. "Why did you bring me here?" I did not allow him to answer before throwing another question at him, "Why are you being nice to me? You could have me arrested and most likely boost your political status."

When he did not answer or even seem to acknowledge my speaking, I stood up hastily and slammed my hands on the table top, shaking the porcelain drink set. No words or curses escaped my mouth, I had felt no need for it; my furrowed eyebrows and gritted teeth spoke loudly enough.

With a small clink, Sasarai placed his cup onto its saucer and raised his head to look at me. His expression was calm and collected, almost foreign compared to the priest I had met on the battlefield months before. As if I was a child, he regarded me with soft discretion. Something in his dark eyes, physically identical yet emotional opposites of mine, compelled me to return to my seat and relaxed my nerves.

"You are Luc, apprentice and servant of Leknaat the Seer."

I had to raise an eyebrow. What was this all about? "Thank you for reminding me," was my sardonic reply.

He merely continued, unphased by my comment. "I am Sasarai, High Priest-General of Holy Harmonia."

I did not bother to grace him with another comment.

"We have nothing at all in common, aside from being True Rune bearers. But there is something more between us, isn't there?"

Silence weighed down on my shoulders and threatened to crush me, but I did not dare to break it. Something? There was quite more than something. The fact that despite all that has occurred between the two of us, he had no memory of any of it, and that had angered me deeply. I hated this boy, for reasons now I forgotten, but nevertheless, the past was what it was and I secretly cherished it for what it had been. For him to have allowed himself to forget, either with the passage of time or even means beyond his control, was unforgivable.

My anger emitted through the silence like steam from a kettle, and he must have noticed. His eyes seemed more pressing as ever and he insisted, "Isn't there?"

"Of course there is," I growled through clenched teeth.

"Tell me."

Those two tiny, meaningless words had contained much more than they let on. As they reached my ears, emotions popped inside me, many of which I had not believed I was capable of feeling. Memories rose from their deep hibernations and flickered behind my eyelids involuntarily.

My eyes squeezed shut, but it only enhanced the images. The rune in my hand prickled the tips of my fingers.

Quickly, I reopened my eyes to shut off the visions. However, many still lingered and as I stared at the young brunette priest in front of me -- eyes full of concern and curiosity -- another image fell neatly into place within my vision.

An odd feeling aroused inside me then, my stomach turned as I watched his mouth move to speak, but the voice was sadistically much younger and saccharine than normal.

"Oii... Nii-chan...?"

The table flipped over, sending the teacups to the clapboard floors in a resounding clash of shattered pieces. Wood hit wood with loud thunks when the chair fell as well, pushed over by my sudden movements. I stood with my back to Sasarai, holding my head tightly so no further memories would escape to haunt me once more. My eyes remained open, wide and alert in fear like a panicked animal. I could feel the stares of other customers inside the Harmonian café, of the shocked priest and others inside my head. All of them, all staring at me.

Stop it. Go away.

"... Go away..." I whispered weakly, unsure if I had been speaking to the stares, to Sasarai or to the past.

The blue-clad figure approached me from the front; a hesitant concern plastered on his features, "... Luc?"

"GO AWAY!"

I threw out my hand and struck the boy before my mind had caught up with the rest of my body. The moment I was able to process the fact I had smacked a high ranking clergy member (in a kingdom of which I was a wanted man, no less), my lips had already moved far too long.

"I don't want your blood, not any of it! You betrayed me long ago, all of you. I will not be the puppet you have become! ...You sick bastard, stop calling me Nii-chan!" I swung to raid the young Sasarai from my sight; however, the older one dodged my clumsy attack.

He continued to stand there, regardless. His large, piercing brown eyes regarding me with fear.

I returned the stare with fogged, distorted mirrors for eyes. The line between memory and reality had crumbled and I was not sure if the voices were from within or outside my head.

"Nii-chan?"

"S-stop..."

"Stop what, Nii-chan?"

"Calling me that..."

"But you're my Nii-chan."

"... You don't understand... I'm not..."

"But that's what you call me, isn't it?"

I wrinkled my tiny nose and huffed at the young boy, identical to myself apart from clothing. This only caused him to smile and tilt his head to the side like he had always done. However, I did not let it get to me this time.

"I call you Nii-chan because that's what you are but it doesn't work the same way for you."

"Why not? We're twins, silly."

"Yes, but..."

"You think too hard."

I stared at the seven-year-old as if he had spoken a foreign language, "You can never think too hard."


"Yes huh. You're always talking about how people are doing things bad, Lord Hikusaak says you think too much."

At the mention of the cursed name I furrowed my eyebrows and glared the best way a child could, showing my blatant disapproval of his statement. "Hikusaak is a nut."

"Nii-chan!"

"An evil nut."

"There you go again! Stop that, Lord Hikusaak loves us!"

For the first time I had been able to recall, I allowed my childish anger to better my sense of reason and I left a painful mark on the boy's cheek with my bare hand.

"How can you even say such a thing...!"

Sasarai stared back in horror, holding his wound comfortingly as tears welled up in the corners of his large eyes.

My hand had not left the position it had been at the end of the swing, and it was then that my vision achieved clarity. Even as reality replaced the fog in my eyes, the same child stared back at me, yet with older eyes and a lighter mark on an aged face. His eyes did not seem as if they were to become faucets, but still held the decency to look hurt.

Why did this hurt you? Am I not your enemy...?

I will not be the puppet you have become!

"I... I must leave..."

"Luc," the priest pressed on. He must have seen himself a mediator, a psychiatrist to this obvious madman.

When his comforting hand extended towards my space, a newly developed (which would soon become staple) dead glance warded him away. At that moment, I packaged the several occasions of blood spilt from my thin wrists, relentless nightmares berrating my slumbering soul, the suffocating loneliness that had consumed my late childhood; I folded all the emotions up into a single, piercing, dominating glare. While my eyes conveyed much, the rest of my expression remained dead, as lifeless as I had become over the course of ten years. I was not sure at that moment if I had come off as a zombie, positioned ready to assault the fresh body before me; or, as an assassin, warning my prey of his imminent demise.

"There is something between us." My eyes continued to level him from within the shield of my hair. I allowed a moment of silence to pass on before walking forward and continuing. "You were once my brother. Now, you are nothing more to me than a memo on my mirror or a blister upon my foot. A constant, painful reminder of what was, what could have been and what shall never be." I lifted my head up and brushed back my locks behind my ears so that the boy would not miss any detail, "As if my rune were not enough, just the sight of you summons memories to my mind that I could do without recalling. Ten years! Such a short period of time and to you I have already become little more than a criminal in the books of the Holy church.

But, do not be mistaken... I care little now. I would not weep a single tear if you were to fall of the edge of the planet tomorrow."

Sasarai intelligently took a step back from me, his face betraying his emotions. Confusion and fear washed over his expressions as large brown eyes widened even further and his dark eyebrows knitted together.

I moved passed him in an almost forced manner and managed to drag my feet to the doorway of the café before glancing back.

"Goodbye, my wonderful elder brother."