Far Gone

See disclaimer in the Prologue

Frightened... so frightened.

The little boy plunked himself down on the corner of the nearest building, tucked his chin to his knees, and started to sob, shaking violently. There were smudges of scraped skin along his face, hands, elbows, and knees, and his soft white clothing was dirty from the falls he'd taken. He felt like he'd been looking forever, and he hadn't found anything. Never before had he felt so afraid.

Always before, he'd been able to find someone he knew when he got lost, which was shamefully often. But now... had they just left him this time? Left him behind, with all the inconveniences he brought?

"Kumo! KUMO!"

He looked up, not daring to hope, his breath catching in his throat.

"Oniichan...?"

Thereshoving through the crowds, a boy slightly older than him, dressed all in red with short messy crimson hair and bright carmine eyes, let out another call. "KUMO!"

"Oniichan!" Shakily, he stood up, running unsteadily towards the short slim figure.

"Ah...!" Turning, the boy in red caught him, folding him into a tight embrace, pressing him to a heart that raced with the adrenaline born of fear. "There you are! Mom and I have been looking all over for you! Where did you get to this time, ototo-chan? You scared us!"

"Kiri-niichan...!" Too relieved even to speak, little Kumo simply burst into tears, burying his face in his big brother's shirt. Kiri, starting to relax himself, stood patiently and cuddled the petite white body until his baby brother's sobbing quieted.

"You always get so lost," he said gently, leaning down to click the nubs of hard gray bone that served as their spikes together affectionately. "You make us worry about you so much. Kumo-chan, you've got to stay with us when we're out; you have no sense of direction."

"I'm sorry," Kumo said humbly.

"Don't worry about it," Kiri replied. "Let's get back. Mom'll get worried." Awkwardly, he pressed his lips to his brother's cheek, tugging him along. "I'm just glad you're okay..."

The images blurred, changed; the moment became a different kiss on the cheek, a different time.

"Good job out in practice today." The voice belonged to Kiri, several years laterthis was his nineteen-year-old self speaking, warmth and mischief in his eyes, long crimson mane tossed carelessly over his shoulder. "I take it that you're feeling a lot better now?"

Kumo tried his best to smile. In truth, he was still slightly uneasy, but Kiri had certainly been right about training taking the edge off of worry. "It was a good idea. Thank you for helping me."

Kiri gave his little brother's white hair a playful ruffle. "Hey, when my cute little ototo-chan wakes up screaming at the crack of dawn, I know I've got to do whatever I can to help him." His expression sobered, and he placed a hand on Kumo's shoulder. "I mean it. Are you honestly alright now? You only smile like that when you're trying to hide something, so don't try to cover it up."

Kumo nodded, the trembling façade dropping from his face as he did so. "Yes. I'm not sure if I'm absolutely perfect, but I really do feel much better than I did. Truly. And I have you to thank for it."

A slow coy smile spread over Kiri's fine features, and he drew close to his brother, his movements almost seductive. "So thank me," he said with a smirk, and leaned forward. Within a matter of instants, their lips were locked together.

As the kiss deepened, Kiri's hands started to move as if they had a mind of their own, running over Kumo's soft firm sides, playing idly with the fastenings of his clothes. Kumo, oblivious so far, let his own hands roam up to Kiri's shoulders, gripping them hard, nails digging in.

The moments passed by like wingbeats, and Kiri's lips wandered from Kumo's to his throat, his collarbones, his shoulders, the soft lobe of his left ear. Kumo's hold tightened, and liquid traced up his spine; he needed Kiri's firm solidity and the wall behind him to stay upright. In between breathless cries of pleasure, he tried to form the words. "Not here... not here..."

"Quiet," the redhead said against the hollow of his little brother's throat. Slowly, they began to slip down the wall, Kumo still weakly trying to protest and Kiri, blatantly ignoring him, covering his slender throat with kitten's kisses. By the time they hit the ground, Kiri had his brother's shirt off, and the white-haired young man was working on undoing the crimson uniform.

Sometime between the impact and the rush of satisfaction when the last of the ties holding Kiri's clothes together finally gave, Kumo's blood began to pulse, flooding his entire body with a strange desperate longing that sang through his being like the enchantments of Mist. He felt himself rise to Kiri's advance, gasping in painful wanting, his eyes half-closed and his face as brilliantly red as his brother's hair, straining, straininglet it be the moment, let it be the time... now...

A heavy footstep near the door brought them back to their senses, and they sprang apart, putting several feet of distance between them, both staring at the door, bodies that had only seconds ago given in to arousal taut and ready for a fight. Another heavy footstep, and then the presence receded.

Kumo sighed and slumped against the wall, collecting his shirt from the floor beside him and holding it to his chest. Kiri shook his head, looking pale and bewildered. They stood mustering their thoughts and words for a few moments, then looked briefly at each other and spoke.

"We need to talk," Kumo said shortly.

"Yes," Kiri replied with a burst of crimson sigh. "Yes, we do."

"Today," Kumo added, giving Kiri a stern look.

"Yes, that. Today would be good."

"Later...?"

"An hour. Gotta go..." Kiri shrugged one shoulder, looking embarrassed. "Take care of, um, stuff..."

Kumo knew what he meant. Even if most of you was perfectly fine with going straight from splitting-your-pants to barroom brawl mode, some of you never quite behaved. "Yeah... go ahead..."

Kiri slunk towards the door. The two of them gave each other one last, confused "What happened here?" look, and parted. Kumo, relieved, sat down very quickly.

"What happened?" he asked aloud. The empty room gave him no answer.

"Would you mind waiting outside for a moment?" Lisa asked the twins. They had made it to the hospital wing of the submarine, and the army's doctor was preparing to take a look at the still-unconscious Makenshi.

Yu nodded, looking confused. "Sure... why?"

Lisa sighed. "I think we're going to have to strip him down to see just how badly he's hurt," she confessed. "I'm just trying to respect his privacy by not having a lot of people around to watch."

Ai gave her a sidelong look. "So then why is it that you can stand to take off Makenshi's clothes when you can't even give Kaze CPR? The love storm rages on..."

Yu grabbed his sister's arm. "C'mon, Sis, you're embarrassing her..." The two of them left, closing the door behind them.

Lisa, staring after them, shook her head. Good question. Ask me some other time and I may have an answer... "So..." She turned back to the doctor. "Let's go, then..."

"Why did you really want them out of the room?" the man asked shrewdly.

"Because I have a feeling that this is going to be pretty bad, and I'm not sure that I want them to see and start asking difficult questions," Lisa replied unhappily but honestly.

With that settled, the two of them got down to business. Between the two of them, they managed to carefully maneuver the young swordsman out of his tattered white clothes, trying not to cause any pain as they did so.

"Pretty bad is a good term for the state of things," the doctor said wryly once they'd finished, looking at Makenshi with his hands planted on his hips. "But I think it's not quite appropriate, given the extent."

Lisa, who thought she'd steeled herself for the worst, was digging her nails into her palm again to keep from crying out in horror. The layers of bruising that had marred the swordsman's face covered his entire body in blotches of blue-purples and pale reds. Thin cuts like scratches formed laced patterns over the bruises, some healed and some not. And traces of blood, dried and fresh, streaked across the insides of his thighs and his groin.

"You said before that you thought this was a case of sexual abuse," the doctor told her, digging in a nearby drawer for gauze and tape. "I think that either you're right and this has been going on for a while, or this guy has an obsession with rough sex and he's really been overdoing it lately. But of those two options, the first one is definitely more probable, if you were right about his behavior earlier." Stacking his finds on the side of the bed, he handed Lisa a thin tube of cream. "Here. Put some antiseptic on these scratches and I'll fix them up. All we can do at this point is take care of the physical wounds; when he wakes up we'll see how badly he's been traumatized by it all. Rape isn't exactly a happy experience for anyone, especially the victim."

Nodding, Lisa took the antiseptic and started working, deep in her worries. What in the world was going on here? Somehow, Makenshi had fallen from the sky, covered in wounds both new and pre-existing. He worked for the Earl, and so this had most likely happened to him there... what was going on? And why would the Deathlords want to harm one of their own, especially like this...?

The little bastard was there. He could sense it. And now that everyone else had left... he was ready to do it, finish things once and for all.

True, much of his memory was still incomplete. He could recall bits and pieces of his childhood and mere fragments of Windaria's end... but he could remember enough to know that that scoundrel had been deeply involved in Aura's death.

He couldn't remember exactly what had happened, but in his heart he knewthe one who was responsible was his nemesis, his rival, his enemythe strange young swordsman known to him as White Cloud.

And tonight... that swordsman would die by his hand.

As quietly as he knew how, he stalked into the infirmary, hand tightening on the grip of his gun. He almost wished that he could end his foe's life with the Magun, but... one solid shot, enough to destroy the brain or the heart, would suffice. Although both their races healed quickly and could withstand many kinds of attacks, that would be enough to finish him. No need to be showy. And no need to drag things out... circumstances had already made the little bastard go through something he himself could never have accomplished: the pain of losing a sibling, the same pain he had suffered so long ago.

It was dark, but his eyes adjusted quickly to the low light. His enemy, White Cloud, was asleep, just as he'd expected, but...

He frowned. It should have been obvious by the fact that he was in the infirmary, but he hadn't expected the swordsman to be wounded like this. He was covered in bruises and light cuts, with bandages covering injuries that were apparently fresh or especially bad. By the folded white clothes on the bedside table, he deduced that his rival was naked beneath the thin sheet laid over him by someone or other. Briefly, he wondered what had happened, but decided that compared to the task of revenge, it wasn't important.

Viciously, he wished that the swordsman's dream was a good one. It was going to be his last.

The pitch darkness threatened to swallow him whole.

He could not see anything, and any kind sound he might hear was drowned out by the harsh breathing above him. And after so long, he was dead to everything but the pain. There was just so much of it that it was hard to focus on anything else... the vague feeling of wrongness combined with the stabs, the flashes of agony that fell in rhythm with the violent rocking of their bodies... the moments when the greedy hands squeezed or the nails dug in so deeply, so hard that he could only give faint cries of pain... the hold on his throat that grew so tight, so painful that he felt almost lightheaded... the roaming touch that left a sickly aching, a burning in its wake. He couldn't move, could barely breathe, could not feel past those touches and the pain with them and the shameful coat of sweat that covered his skin. It hurt. Chaos meant it to hurt.

It was all just so wrong. He was sure that things were not supposed to feel this way... they hadn't on that day when, so long ago, he and Kiri had almost done it... but he could never be completely certain. He'd never felt them any differently.

The shame was almost as bad. It happened often... he would be called in whenever Chaos was angry or frustrated. He was an outlet for it all, just a convenient way to take out those base emotions and the built-up lust and gain power too, while the fiend was at it. His own despair threatened to overwhelm him every day, stifling his cries and cutting him off from his own emotions. Every time it happened, he lay as still as he could until the paralysis, the exhaustion was enough at bay that he could stand, leave, regroup his strength, dodge the bawdy remarks from Chaos' other servants, and hide alone, nursing his bruises and the cuts and waiting until they healed enough to be hard to see before showing his face again. Every time, as he sat alone in a corner with a finger to his bleeding lips, he was silent, and motionless, unable to cry. If ever he did, he wouldn't be able to stop, and so he was thankful for that. Instead, he asked himself why. Why did he never fight back, why did he never refuse? Was he just too much of a coward, or was it as they all said... that he secretly enjoyed it all? He didn't know, but the question chasing around his mind cut him deeply every time it came into the light.

He watched Kaze from a distance, letting the only thing that wasn't despair or hatred course through his heart. The word was... sympathy. Or better... empathy.

You and I are the same, he thought to himself. We walk alone in this world, each of us on our given path, unable to turn from it. You cannot escape bloodshed, and I... I cannot escape this shameful place.

His life had no meaning, but he had no way to end things. He could not die until Chaos was defeated...

He could not stand to live, and yet he could not die...

"Wake up," Kaze said softly in a voice laced with hatred.

Makenshi stirred, then tensed. As he caught sight of Kaze's silhouette, he flinched away, his jadeine eyes suddenly wide and filled with wild panic.

"No... no!" His voice was filled with fear, high-pitched with hysteria, sounding on the verge of tears. "Stay away! Stay away!"

Kaze blinked, caught off guard. Where had this reaction come from? This wasn't like his rival at all... Makenshi always faced Kaze with the same countenance of quiet composure, surety, and sorrow. Where had the swordsman's confidence gone? Why was he so afraid?

"No! Don't... don't touch me!" Kaze, still confused, started to take a step forward, and Makenshi shrank away, his body forming a protective half-curl, his hands clenched into fists at his chest and his thighs tucked tightly together. "Don't!"

Utterly baffled, Kaze stepped back instead. He was starting to understand that there was something seriously wrong hereMakenshi's blind, out-of-control fear and his defensive posture screamed outa warning, not to mention that his mental state seemed to be very fragile. What in the world was going on?

"Please don't..." Makenshi said in a soft, cracking voice, his eyes starting to fill with tears, his entire face begging hopelessly. "Please... please... not again... don't hurt me again..."

The lights snapped on, and Kaze heard Lisa, behind him, begin to ask, "What's going?" but fall silent as she took in the scene. Kaze looked back at her uncertainly as if to ask her if he'd done something wrong, then glanced at his trembling rival.

A flicker of recognition finally lit Makenshi's jadeine eyes, and he spoke softly, hesitantly, his voice shaking. "Kaze...?" As he spoke the name, a single tear slipped down his cheek.

(TBC)