8. Mend What I've Broken

Ardyn awoke with a start.

She wasn't sure when she fell asleep, she never went to bed. More importantly, she wasn't sure what had awakened her.

It was the first moments of dawn, the pale light drowning the bulbs of the city in a cold, surreal luminance. The air in her apartment was stale, her sheets were cold.

Then the noise that had awakened her came again.

It was a knock. So few of those came to her, for obvious reasons.

She sat up on the couch and reached for the knife she kept in the cushion. Her bare feet crept across the floor with almost no sound, blade drawn. She wasn't sure what to expect when she looked through the peephole; the end of a gun, maybe?

Ibis was not it.

Still, she hesitated to open the door.

"I know you're there, sweet pea," her voice was softer then Ardyn had ever heard it. "Please open up."

Ardyn opened the door until the chain pulled tight.

Ibis gave a gentle smile and held up a box, "Earl Grey still your favorite?"

Ardyn pinched her brows, "How-?"

"Couldn't've forgotten if I tried," Ibis answered.

Ardyn still looked confused. She shut the door and undid the chain before opening it again.

Ibis stood there, busted lip and guilty eyes. Her mouth pushed up into a soft smile. "Can I come in?"

Ardyn sighed and threw her arm out in invitation.

Ibis stepped inside and set the tea box on the island. She watched her sister close the door and lock it before numbly walking into the kitchen and putting on the kettle. Her hair was mussed, hopefully from sleep. Ibis set the box down and stripped off her jacket. The stool that was tucked under the bar on one side of the island creaked a little when she sat down, the sound only noticeable due to the deafening silence of the room. Ardyn set a steaming mug before her, but didn't look up as she steeped the tea bag in her own.

Ibis didn't take her eyes off of Ardyn as she tore open the package and steeped, guilt knotting tighter in her chest.

"I messed everything up again," her voice was barely over a whisper, "didn't I, sweet pea."

Ardyn looked up, her tired eyes swollen from crying and shadowed from too little sleep.

"You really care about them, don't you," Ibis continued.

Ardyn's eyes fell back down to the mug, "Yes."

"And... I'm going to go out on a limb and say the one with the blue," she gestured to her face and paused as Ardyn's gaze came up again, "...is the one you're closest to?"

Ardyn drew her lips in between her teeth, then wet them as she let out a breath through her nose, "Yes."

"I figured that's why he was up there," Ibis took a sip of the tea. "He cares about you. They all do. You found a little family here."

Ardyn looked up at her, apprehensive of her next words.

Ibis gave a soft smile, the gesture pulling on the fresh wound. "I'm glad you're not alone."

Ardyn pinched her brows, "What?"

"It hurt a little," Ibis explained. "But I am happy for you. I'm sorry that I had to hurt you first, though. That wasn't right of me."

Ardyn looked at her like she had sprouted another head. Ibis never apologized for anything. She'd always been a 'take me as I am or watch me as I go' type of person. That was what had caused such a rift between them... that and the death of their little brother. Ibis had insisted that she was trying to do the right thing, and so was he. It hurt Ardyn to hear that the situation that had lead to his death wasn't something Ibis would take back, and it hurt Ibis that Ardyn forever blamed her for their loss. To hear her apologize for hurting Ardyn's feelings when it was something Ardyn knew Ibis was going to be upset about was absolutely baffling.

"Why?"

Ibis looked up, her mug hovering in the air, "Why what?"

"After all these years...everything we've been through...Why? Why now?"

Ibis abandoned the thought of taking a sip of tea, setting it to the counter, "I've learned a lot in the past few months... About life, about what happened when we were kids... about myself... We've had to make a lot of hard choices. A lot of choices other kids didn't have to make, and I guess I got so caught up in what I thought my purpose was that I forgot what life is really about. And I'm afraid I might be too late to fix what I've broken."

Her velvet eyes met the cool, crystalline stare of her sister's. She gave a weak smile, "I don't expect your forgiveness. I'm not so sure I'd forgive me if I was in your place, but I would like to try and make things right. With you and your friends."

Ardyn looked apprehensive, "You're not going to hunt them?"

Ibis shook her head definitively, "No. If they're good enough to have your seal of approval, I have no reason to do anything."

"How do I know you're not just saying that?"

Her face became less soft, her features solidifying into a serious expression that sent a chill up Ardyn's spine. "I give you my word, by my hand, by my gun, by my blade, no harm will come to your friends."

Ardyn couldn't speak.

Ibis's features softened guiltily as she remembered the confrontation with the big one and she raised the mug to her lips, "...starting now."

Ardyn's brows dropped, "What do you mean, 'starting now'?"

Ibis swallowed the tea, "I may or may not have already decked one of your buddies in the face."

"What?!" Ardyn gripped the counter, about to go off, then stopped, "Wait, which one?"

"The big one with the red-" Ibis gestured over her head.

Ardyn relaxed, "Oh, that's Just Raph. He'll be fine."

Ibis gave her a look to say 'oh, really?'.

Ardyn snorted into her mug, "No, it's not like that- its just, well- he's kind of a hot head. I'm surprised that's all you did."

Ibis's mouth pulled genuinely into a smile, "I kinda figured he was the rebel of the group."

"Why'd you hit him?"

"He was runnin' his mouth," Ibis grumbled.

"Yeah, sounds like Raph," Ardyn mumbled into her tea.

"Raph?"

"Raphael," Ardyn clarified.

"Hm. Nice name," Ibis sipped her tea.

"Mhm."

"What about the rest of them?" Ibis asked.

Ardyn smiled, "The tall one is Donnie. He's the most brilliant person I've ever met."

"A real egghead, huh?"

She laughed, "Yeah. Likes to dabble in everything: technology, machinery, medicine... you name it."

Ibis's mouth pulled up on one side as Ardyn spoke so fondly of them.

"The smallest one is Mikey," she continued. "He's probably the most fun person in the world. An absolute ray of sunshine. He's the baby brother, and everyone's really protective of him."

Ibis let out a breathy hm of a laugh.

"You met Raphael, I'm assuming," Ardyn looked at her.

Ibis nodded, "Not formally, but he sure knows me."

"He may be intimidating, but he's a big teddy bear," Ardyn picked up her mug and looked into it, "if teddy bears were four hundred pounds of muscle and anger issues."

Tea nearly came out of Ibis's nose.

"And Leo..." Ardyn got a faraway look in her eyes. "...Leo's not like anybody I've ever met before. He's so sure of himself. He's smart, and meticulous, and so patient... He's the leader of their team, much to Raph's dismay. But he's so great at it. He has this natural quality of leadership about him. It's a commanding presence that's so... evident."

Ibis tilted her head.

"Being around him just makes you feel so serene, you know," her eyes were on nothing in particular as she spoke. "Like nothing bad will ever get to you."

Ibis looked back into her mug, a knowing smile on her face. "How long have you been together?"

The spell was broken. Ardyn's eyes snapped back to her, "What?"

"The only time a woman has that look on her face is when she's got it bad. I may not be a love doctor, but I know it when I see it. You're in deep. You don't have to tell me if you don't want to, but your poker face is terrible," she put the mug back to her lips.

Ardyn was red from her neck to the tips of her ears, "Well, I-"

Ibis looked back up, her cup freezing in place. She swallowed her tea, "Why are you blushing? Did I unearth a secret?"

Ardyn began to sputter.

"Sweet pea," Ibis tipped her head, lowering her cup and turning her head to eye Ardyn suspiciously, "Does he know you feel a physical attraction toward him?"

The red of her face turned to an almost purple.

"Oh my god!"

"Ibis, stop," Ardyn covered her face with her hands.

"You want to bang Leader boy and he doesn't even know?"

"Ibis lower your voice," Ardyn hissed.

"What, I can't say 'bang'?"

"No."

"Copulate."

"Ibis."

"Too clinical? Okay, how about horizontal tango?"

Ardyn just looked at her incredulously.

"Pants-off-dance-off?"

Glare.

Quieter, "Park his car in your garage?"

Disgust and disbelief crossed her features, "Jesus, Ibis, that's terrible!"

"Oh, honey, that's nothing," Ibis sat back and started to number things off on her hands. "Boning, two-person push-ups, take a trip to pound-town, get some stank on the hang-down-"

"I swear to god, Ibis, if you don't shut up I'm going to start throwing things at you."

"Test the suspension."

Ardyn glared.

Ibis was grinning smugly.

A silent moment passed between them.

"Smash pissers."

"That's it!"

Ardyn took off, chasing Ibis into the living room. She picked up a throw pillow and hurled it at Ibis. Ibis dodged, and turned back while Ardyn was reloading.

"Fornicate!"

Ardyn threw another pillow.

Ibis hopped over it, "Aggressive cuddling."

A sofa cushion.

"Batter-dippin' the corn dog."

A wadded up blanket.

"Alright, alright, I give!" she put her arms up in surrender.

Ardyn lowered the other couch cushion, "Good."

"It's really none of my business if you two are rubbing the fun bits."

"Ibis!"

She dodged a couch cushion and hid behind a chair, only popping up to say, "Shafting!"

Ardyn threw a discarded throw pillow as Ibis dove behind the island.

"Slophockey!"

A cardboard tube from the paper towel roll flew by her head.

She made a low swatting motion, "Tappin' ass."

An empty noodle box.

She dove into the living room, "Lockin' legs 'n' swappin' gravy!"

A magazine.

She dove behind the couch, "Slippin' her-" she ducked below the couch back to avoid another wadded-up blanket, then stood to do a hip swivel, "-the hot beef in-jec-tion."

A snort escaped Ardyn's nose and she slapped a hand over her mouth.

"Really?!" Ibis put her hands on her hips. "That's what broke you?!"

"That was disgusting!" Ardyn said through a fit of giggles.

"Grosser than 'slop hockey'?"

"Shut up."