Invictus

by twistedservice

You wanted to play this game, did you not? You wanted to play this game - now you can lose it.

63. Twisted

Epilogue, Part Three: ?

---

Life and death was funny, you see.

It tended to work in the same way for everyone. You lived for however long you were given, and then you died. Some got a hundred years, and some got fifty. Some got almost none at all - misfortune, people would say. Unfortunate tragedy, that loss of human life.

And some of them, the truly unlucky bastards, died in the Hunger Games.

Not them, though.

And lady luck would have it, though it really wasn't luck at all, that they hadn't died after it either.

It was funny how that worked, wasn't it?

You see, some people chose life, but there were some that chose death. They, in a twisted sort of fashion, had chosen both. They were good at that. Not many people really were, but the handful that had the capabilities were out there, somewhere, and it was in that somewhere that they fit. It was in that somewhere where safety existed, the only place left for them.

Tarquin knew Pandora Quinn was smart the second he met her, but he never knew how quite smart. And he didn't think, for one, that she was capable of deception. It turns out that death faking, though, was less deception and more carefully thought out planning. Neither of those two things had been a thought in his mind when he had done it himself down in the mines - it had just been survival. Then again, wasn't that what had been on her mind, too? Them surviving? That's all she had wanted.

Planning got you really far when you knew what you were doing. To be honest, he didn't feel like he did, most times. But she was different.

It involving having many things, more than he could. Timing and people and money, lots of money. A few eyewitnesses in the proper spots to corroborate the story. Bodies that no one would recognize or miss. A medical examiner in your back pocket. Forged death certificates and autopsy reports.

She was smart, except smart didn't feel like a strong enough word.

So he was dead, technically. Legally. Only the people around him now and Pandora knew, though he suspected Evander and Crynn would soon enough.

It was just too risky to let people know in the moment - they had learned that the hard way. Too many people knowing each and every little detail led to bad things. Bad things led to people dying.

People like him. Like he said, he was dead now.

He didn't feel dead, though. He felt more alive than ever as he hauled himself over the fence at the city's eastern boundary and then pulled Ria over after him. Emmi was waiting for them at the furthest edge of the rail-yard from the main station, perched on one of the empty cars, swinging her legs back and forth. She socks him in the shoulder the second he gets close.

"How was the water?" she asks.

"Cold." He looks her over, but she's looking more at the ground than she is him. "Good?"

Emmi nods, though it's not convincing. She's not all the way okay, but she knows that's fine. She doesn't have to be right now.

They have time to fix that, now.

"They haven't shown up yet?" Tarquin asks.

"Not yet."

"Icarus probably made them both fall off for real," Ria says, a hint of humor to her voice that Emmi very rarely hears. She snorts. It's sort of a funny, but awful thing to imagine. If only it was less likely.

They do show though, much to Emmi's surprising care. Soran sticks his head around the rail car and tries to scare them like he's taking the job of being dead and probably a ghost a little too seriously. She nearly smacks him upside the head. All of them in varying degrees still look as if they want to go for real, but they lost that option now. No one is going to let anyone else do it.

They've been given specific instructions, and Emmi feels responsible for remembering them. It's a specific time and railway line, one number of a hundred marked on each car in a line fifty long. It takes nearly as long as to find it as it did to get here in the first place, but with much ambling along and questioning anything is possible, even for them.

Ria's the one to find it, unsurprisingly. Skulking around in the dark just fits her too well. It's the forty-third car in the entire line, empty for some unknown reason. There's a rusted over door at the back platform that pulls open with a minute of stubborn pulling.

Emmi's really not the questioning type, is her problem. She accepts things or she doesn't, and she just has to accept this. She knows where they're supposed to get off and the handful of other places where it's safe to do so, but not truly where any of them are. Pandora is probably about to send them to middle of nowhere, Alaska and none of them would be any the wiser.

She looks around. The loading platform is far, far away in the distance, a cluster of lights and a few moving bodies.

She prods at Tarquin's shoulder. "In."

He obeys, looking none too happy about being the first to step into the darkness. There's nothing there, she wants to tell him, but there's no use. People only believe things on their own time.

And Emmi, for one, will believe they're safe when they actually are.

She herds all of them into the blackness of the empty train car and then inches the door shut behind them. The only light is coming from the window at the top of it, which is so small you could barely fit an arm out. Emmi can't see two feet in front of her nose, let alone anyone else.

"This is going to be a fun however many hours," Soran says, sounding particularly joyful. She clutches the bag tighter against her chest, conveniently the only thing they have left to their names besides each other and the clothes on their backs. Some food and water, an emergency phone.

The gun, but she wasn't supposed to have kept that.

"I'm gonna die in here," Icarus announces, and she shuffles over until she bumps into the vaguely him sized shape in the middle of the car. He squawks not unlike a bird, flapping his arms until he's far enough away from her. It does wonders to ease the sky high dose of nerves that are living inside her.

"You'll be fine."

"I won't," he announces. If he's not fine chances are no one else will be, but he hasn't ventured down that road just yet. Icarus inches his way back over until he nudges into Soran's back, and then grabs a hold of his arm.

"What, you afraid the boogeyman is going to get you in here?" Soran asks, amused.

"Absolutely terrified."

"Pretty sure you're holding onto the only boogeyman in here," Ria points out. It's so quiet that he doesn't think anyone else in the car was intended to hear, but the silence practically allows it to bounce of all four walls and echo around. Soran laughs like that's the most delightful thing he's ever heard - Icarus can both hear it and feel it where he's holding onto him.

"Your newfound shady side is my favorite," Emmi tells her.

"My what?"

"Don't question it."

That's how they stand until the whole train lurches a bit; he digs his nails into Soran's arm even though he feels quite steady in comparison. Soon the train itself becomes so loud that he can barely hear himself think, and surely wouldn't be able to hear anyone else. The whole thing is rocking about like its about to tip off the tracks, and Soran drags him down to the floor before anyone can do the same.

And that really is how it goes. The hours are uncountable. It's them and the cold, filthy ground of the train car and almost complete darkness. Even when the sun rises and transforms into day the light is still only able to seep in through the barest cracks, creating little shadows and slivers of daylight where nothing else exists.

He, for the most part, just lays nearly unmoving and lets himself remain that way, eating when something is passed his way and hopping off for a few minute break when the train stops every few hours. Sometimes, often times, he's tempted to sit down on the ground outside the train and just not get back on. It's a multitude of destinations - forests and mountains and flat, grassy lands with water in the distance. Chances are he'd die out there in the wilderness with nothing to save him, but you never know. He's technically survived worse.

He doesn't want to have to just survive, anymore. Ideally he'd like to actually live, which is what gets him crawling back into the train after every stop, staying close to the tracks to avoid being seen. Of course he still ends up just lying down most of the time, letting his head and every other part of his body jerk and bump up with the rhythm of the train.

He sleeps, once in a while. Not much. His mind is stuck warring between what they left and where they're going - they don't even really know where they're going, though.

It's just a distant thought, even though they're getting closer. Emmi is marking down each stop, counting down to the last one.

Soran sits down next to him, sometimes, and right now. "Deep in thought, are we?"

Icarus shrugs. If he is deep in thought he's sure as shit not getting anywhere with them.

"Do you think it worked?" he asks. "Do you think people actually believe we're dead? They could be looking for us right now."

"They're not."

"How do you know?"

"Because people who jump off bridges typically don't get looked for in places beyond the water below."

They didn't jump, though. Maybe they should have.

"Ease up," Soran says. "We're good remember?"

Soran actually believes that when he never really has before. When in his right mind, if he even has one, has he ever been good? Sure, they're headed off to some undisclosed location and are most likely going to be facing an actual, literal boogeyman, but who cares? What's worse than what they've already been through?

He shuffles down onto his back next to Icarus, pinning his arm to the floor. "We're fine."

"I certainly hope so," Emmi interrupts, a comment less snide than usual. "It ought to be the next one. Two hours, give or take?"

Icarus rolls over onto his stomach, grumbling something before it's muffled by the floor. He tugs his arm out from where it's pinned by Soran's side, hugging it against chest. If Soran had to make an educated guess he's probably willing himself to die on the floor in the next two hours.

That's how they stay for the majority of the next two hours. One of them keeps moving, inevitably, trying to get comfortable in a situation that won't allow it. Tarquin starts pacing with about a half hour left, and Soran begins trying to trip him at about twenty, although is forced to stop once Ria gets to her feet. He thinks he'd feel too bad if he accidentally sent her flying onto her own face.

It's not long before he feels the slowing motion of the train and all of the noises associated with it, high-pitched and deafening to a fault. It always takes a few minutes to stop all the way, but this time feels even longer. He sits there not so patiently while it does, anxiously tapping his foot on the ground. It's so loud otherwise he doesn't think anyone either hears or notices it. He'd be getting chewed out by now if someone had.

Emmi pokes her head out the door. He nearly bowls her over in her quest to get a look outside as well.

"Didn't she say to look for a road?"

"Yeah," he answers.

"If that's the road, we might be fucked," she says, pointing to a break in the trees. It looks more like a footpath than a road, hardly big enough to be the latter at all. The dirt disappears into the trees on either side, the undergrowth encroaching at the edges. The trees beyond it get darker and darker until the path winds away and disappears.

"Well, time to find out," he says, though he waits for her to step out and hop into the dirt below the platform in favor of just shoving her and hoping for the best. It's an evolution at its finest.

He edges off the tracks after her and onto the beginning of the road. There are signs of life, at least, faded tire tracks worn into the dirt, but it ends five feet before the tracks and goes nowhere at all.

If this really is where they're supposed to be they must come this way regularly. For supplies, maybe, if that's what the trains headed this way to do. It's certainly not fast enough to be transporting anything fanatical. He walks all the way to the bend far into the trees, and after that they open up a bit, the road twisting through a clearing before it disappears into the hills. He still has no idea where they are.

There's a car, though, tucked away at the side of the road. It's nearly lost in the foliage. There's someone behind the wheel, too, just close enough that Soran can make out every detail.

Icarus grabs a handful of his shirt between his shoulders and yanks at him so hard he nearly falls over backwards. "Do you think he's going to kill us?"

"Why would he kill us?"

"Well, didn't he kill a decently large handful of Capitol people back in the day?" Tarquin asks. They all look in various degrees or stages of vaguely sick.

"Didn't we do that too?" he asks. Emmi nods thoughtfully.

The numbers don't add up into anything good on either side. If Soran really cared about how many people any of them have killed then he wouldn't be doing this at all. If anything it's just going to help them blend in better at their intended destination; that's how he's choosing to think about this.

Blending in or not, he doesn't think getting along with Luca Arker of all people is just a thing that happens.

He rolls down the window all the way until he can lean out, slightly. Both him and Emmi have identical smiles on their faces when he does so, though he suspects they're both more uneasy than either of them would care to admit. Ria seems to have little issue with admitting anything; Soran feels her shuffle behind him without so much as a word until she's out of sight entirely.

He doesn't blame her, really. He just doesn't have the same option.

"You going to stand there all day, or are you going to get in the car?" Luca asks. Ria leans around him to get a better looking, appraising both him and the car as if the two sitting there like that is anything inherently dangerous. For all she knows it is.

While getting braver by the day, she for one would be perfectly content to stand there all day like Luca suggested.

He's helping them, though, or at least trying to. He wouldn't be here if he wasn't.

They stand there so long that he even reaches over to kick one of the adjacent doors open, eyebrows raised expectantly. It's not the least forthcoming she's ever seen someone act; she's not one to talk, anyway.

"You guys owe me one," Emmi hisses, starting for the kicked open door. She doesn't look like she really wants to when she swings herself into the passenger seat, leaving the four of them to cram into the bench along the back. At least Tarquin is kind enough to allow her to be the last one in; she's still shoved between him and the door, but she keeps two fingers looped over the handle just in case.

She's also conveniently right behind Luca's seat.

"To be fair," Luca starts. "All five of you have killed someone more recently than I have. So if anyone has a good reason to run screaming from this car, it's me."

"You could kill all five of us in about ten seconds," Soran points out.

"Less," Luca insists. "But I won't. Don't make me regret that."

He starts the car and pulls around the opposite way onto the road. Ria forces herself to release the door handle and starts to breathe again, letting some of the tension in her chest go free. Luca's not going to hurt them; he has no reason to. He wouldn't go to all of this trouble for no reason.

She busies herself with looking out the window just as they pass through the rest of the clearing into the hills beyond. It's a very pretty place, wherever it is. Much more green and natural than anything she's ever been given the privilege to step into. It's getting dark all over again but there's enough light still for her to make out just how beautiful it really is.

"So where are we going?" Emmi asks.

"You'll see in about ten minutes."

"East coast?"

"As close as you can get."

"And how many people there are in total agreement that they're not going to fuck us over in the next few years?" Icarus questions.

"You ask a lot of questions."

"Just curious."

"All several hundred of them. Listen, if we didn't think we were capable of keeping you here and protecting you then we wouldn't be doing it in the first place. Of those several hundred most of them have been through enough in their lifetime that they don't want or need anything else awful happening, myself included. Just trust in that, if not in me directly."

Ria wants that level of trust. She's never had it before. It would be nice to have it and accept it and cherish it in a way that she thinks she deserves. It's about time they all had something like that in their lives.

"Tomorrow morning we'll sort this all out," Luca says. "The short notice didn't allow much. It might be tough for a few weeks but by then we'll have more housing sorted out, proper arrangements, all that. But we'll take care of it. You might just have to get used to having little to no personal space for a bit."

"Already used to that," Soran says, and Icarus throws an elbow at his side that she ends up feeling all the way at the other end of the bench.

Ria's gotten used to it too - it's still in no way her favorite thing to deal with, but her options are deal with it or go back to the Capitol and throw herself into the lake for good.

Like Tarquin said, it was cold. She doesn't want to.

The hills open up a bit, and in the distance over the trees Ria sees a flicker of more of it, off in the distance. Lights, too, dim in the setting sun. She can imagine how bright they'd be in the proper dark, a little beacon tucked away among the trees and coast. It's just like he said, room for enough people that it was home but small enough that it was safe. That it was everything you would need.

"Well, home sweet home," Luca says. "Hopefully."

That's all she wants.

There's a sign along the side of the road, standing strong. A number is at the bottom, flashing by too fast for her to make out, but she can see it in practicality. A couple hundred, just like Luca said.

She saw the name, though, dead center. FORTUNA.

"Well, it's no Death Valley, but I think it'll do," Tarquin murmurs.

Ria smiles. It will. She believes that.

And maybe, like its name suggests, it will give them what they've needed for a long time now.

---

Tarquin is awoken by a suspiciously loud bang, a series of slightly quieter thumps, and an entire choir's worth of muffled swears.

He lies very still on the couch and counts to ten, staring at the ceiling. Everybody else, it appears, hasn't been disturbed by any of this. It was just after dark when Luca finally left them with the sidenote that he was just down the street in case of emergency, which had done wonders for Tarquin's already beyond fucked sleeping schedule. It was light now. Someone was here. Is Luca back already, then?

Tarquin allows himself to look over the edge of the couch in time for something strangely human shaped, yet very small, to go shooting down the hall and into what he remembers is the bathroom for no apparent reason at all.

He dares to peer over-top of the cushions. The front door is wide open and against the back wall - that must have been what he heard. Someone is standing just inside, holding yet another small human being about the same size as the other in one arm and balancing an oversized bag in the crook of the second.

Tarquin blinks. Blair smiles. "Hello. Can you either take one of these from me or go get him out of the bathroom before he destroys it?"

He sort of awkwardly slithers off the couch and stumbles half-asleep down the hall rather than approach the door, which is a terrifying prospect when he can barely think straight. Inside the bathroom he gets a curious look from the apparent two year old that's invaded it, on his tip toes and apparently going for anything on the counter that he can reach.

"Hi," he says. "Can you come with me?"

He gets a look for that, one that feels like absolutely the fuck not in toddler speak. Tarquin decides to bite the bullet and scoop him up off the floor before he can dig his hole any deeper. He likes kids, don't get him wrong, he's just never had any experience in dealing with them. He certainly doesn't know what to do when this one starts squirming the second Tarquin traps him in his arms.

When he turns to the front room Blair has wrangled the bag onto the kitchen counter and the other child into one of the kitchen chairs, but he appears to be sitting there obediently unlike the one Tarquin's just barely got a hold on. They're not identical, but certainly similar enough that they have to be twins. Suddenly he feels even better for not dropping what appears to be one of Blair's actual children facedown in the hallway.

"I come bearing food," Blair says. "Don't know why the fuck anyone left me in charge of this, but here we are."

"So this is where you all live?"

"What gave you that impression?"

Why is Tarquin the only one awake for this? He's not sure he's equipped to handle anything at this level, not with a squirming child in his arms on top of it. He reaches over the other couch and waves his hand about, hitting whoever's down there, and a second later deposits the kid on top of them. He's not sure who between them successfully grabs onto him first, but he hears Soran start to swear the same way Blair did, so he's assuming it was him.

Nothing looks wrong with it. Blair looks like this is just every-day, and the toddler at the table is munching away at whatever's been given to him in otherwise silence. Sure, the one Soran's now trying to wrangle may have to be pinned to the couch to avoid watching him face-plant off the couch and into the coffee table, but that's life.

Blair turns around. "Ezra, don't make me come over there," he says, but the assumed Ezra continues successfully beating up on whatever part of Soran he can reach.

And Blair doesn't move, either. He looks a little tired, maybe, but who isn't these days?

He looks happy most of all, and Tarquin could use some of that.

He's ready for it now.

—

It's actually nice out for once.

Emmi can't remember the last time it was actually nice back in the Capitol save for maybe the last day they were there, which wasn't a nice day at all. So there's that.

Here it's actually sunny, and there are a few puffy white clouds drifting across the sky. There are actual trees and grass just about everywhere, and the air smells clean unlike the smog-infested skies of the city. It's just this put-together, almost quaint little town surrounded by what feels like an actual personification of peace.

It's a weird thing to experience firsthand.

She heads out on her own for the first time when she finally sees it fit to leave everyone else alone, which is the most terrifying part. She won't be surprised to return to a burnt-out shell of a house. There aren't many people out just yet, but there are supposedly only a few hundred anyway. Everyone here probably knows each other, a handful of citizens combined with victors and survivors and ultimately, a ton of legitimate murderers.

Well, at least she fits in.

There's nowhere to really go - she wasn't given any directions beyond Blair telling her that if she wandered too far into the woods off a path he wasn't coming to look for her. Tarquin said he would, though. Little victories.

There is someone following her, but Emmi's not concerned. The girl can't be any older than ten at the very most, and she's not sticking too close. Probably just nosy. Everyone's going to be.

She doesn't like the crawling of her skin, though, so she stops and turns around. The girl doesn't even falter, giving her a bright smile that seems to match the very energy of everything around her.

"Hi," she chirps. "You're Emmi, right?"

Oh, this kid's definitely got a murderer in the family if she knows who Emmi is and has zero fear in regards to following her around.

"Sure am," she answers. "And who are you?"

"Ivy. Your hair's cool. I've never met anyone with pink hair."

Says the kid with hair so ginger it ought to hurt someone's eyes. "Do your parents know what you're doing, Ivy?"

"Yeah. He doesn't care usually so long as I stay on the roads and come back when he tells me to. He also told me not to bug you but I'm kinda bad at that."

Emmi smiles. Nosy she is, but self-awareness is a gift too. It's one that's becoming more and more valuable these days. Emmi waits, but Ivy stays put, smiling like she's got the sun trapped inside her. She had full intentions to do this alone; she's been working at being by herself, lately. It's good for her.

But she doesn't always have to be.

"Well, let's go, then," she invites. "Someone has to show me around."

Ivy beams. Maybe being alone isn't all it's cracked up to be.

—

"This is so fucking weird," Icarus decides.

"Tell me something I haven't already heard you say a half dozen times today already," Soran says, rolling over. He's apparently decided the barren floor is more comfortable than the couch and its crammed contents, because he's abandoned Icarus and taken the pillow along for the ride. An absolute fucking betrayal, if you ask him.

He could say so many things, but he's stuck on today. Everything about it was just that: weird. All the people and the fucking nine just live out here like nothing ever happened, and so does the Prometheus group. And it's all just fine. No one ever dies of anything but old age, and even that's rare out here with so few people. Everyone seems happy. Beyond happy, really.

Could that be a thing for them?

Everyone else seems to think so, because everyone but the two of them are out cold again for the night, easy as pie. Tarquin's the only one actually down here since they forced Emmi and Ria to sleep in the lone bed upstairs for the night, but he's buried under two blankets and barely visible.

It's nice. They're working on more houses and settling them in and no one looks at him like he's some crazed murdering psychopath. They could all kill him ten times over, he assumes, so he's not worried about that.

He drops his arm off the couch. "Get back up here."

"There is not near enough room. If you want me you're coming down here."

He sure is. Icarus grabs the last of the blankets and eases himself down on the floor, and then inchworms his way over.

Soran rolls over. "I didn't think you actually would."

"You should've."

Soran hums in agreement. Of all things, that should be predictable now. He was always going to come down here no matter what, scoot all the way over, and leach out all the warmth and closeness that he could possibly get. At least now Soran accepts it and no longer looks disgruntled at the fact.

Everyone here is good like Soran says they are. They're older, and a lot of them have kids, and they're just good. He may not know what he wants in the future, and it may be uncertain with everything that's going on, but he wants something. Maybe not all of it, but some of it.

He has to start somewhere.

"You really wanna know something I haven't said to you at all today?" he asks, leaning into his side.

"Go for it."

"There has to be something wrong with me—"

"There is."

"Shut up," he insists, poking him in the side. "I wasn't finished. There's definitely something wrong with me, and you know why? I'm pretty sure I'm in love with you."

He has to drag it out of his throat in such a way that it doesn't come out stilted, in pieces, and gets utter silence as a response. He expected that. He's not sure if the expectancy is comforting, or if he wants to throw up.

He sits up, propping his chin on the flat of Soran's shoulder. He's staring at the ceiling, not even blinking.

"You're totally right," Soran says slowly. "There is something wrong with you."

"Shut up," he repeats. "I'm serious, okay? I am. And I'm not expecting anything back, either. Just so you know. You don't have to say anything. I don't care."

"You care."

"I do," he says quietly. "But it's fine, hey? For right now, like you said, we're good."

And strangely enough, he is. Where did that part of him go, the one that obsessively craved validation and approval? Sure, he still has very little desire to let go of him, ever, but he can. He can and he doesn't feel bad when he does.

Soran turns to look at him. There's something going on in that brain there, but Icarus can't tell what it is for the life of him. He can't tell if Soran's about to say it back or if he's about to say something stupid, or maybe him saying it back would be stupid. Whatever it is, it's causing him some sort of mental trauma the longer he thinks about it. Icarus can't even make an educated guess as to what's causing that.

He shifts, getting comfortable as comfortable can be on the damn floor, leans in to kiss him quickly, and then puts his head back on his shoulder. "Night."

Soran sighs. He sounds more troubled than Icarus would like, but he's learned not to push. "Night," he responds, but he curls his entire arm around Icarus' back and lets it rest there. It feels okay. He thinks it is.

And as long as it is, he can sleep easy.

—

Much as he thinks he loathes it, Soran is used to the insane hustle and bustle of things.

It's all the same - the Academy and the streets and the housing in One all bordered on homes for the clinically insane, among everything else. It's because of that that he isn't flinching now. People are constantly in and out of the house, adults and children alike, over the next few days. There are several children here right now, in fact. The oldest at three, Rina, is attempting and failing to be of any help in the kitchen to Dimara, who looks as if she's doing more of stepping over her own child than any actual work. Maybe that is work.

The other one, her younger sister, is supposedly napping. Soran's more inclined to believe she's wrecking something upstairs while they can't tell, but to each their own.

He's almost certain there's another one round here somewhere too, one of the Carnell's. Something about Nadir needing a free hand which resulted in her being able to keep only one child on hand.

It's about average levels of quiet in here despite the bustle, so he's almost certain it's not Ezra. As if on cue Matteo appears between his chair and Icarus', staring up at the crackers he's been trying to eat for about ten minutes now. He reaches down to scoop him off the floor before he can get anywhere near mad about his pitiful reach.

"Those are mine," he warns him, setting him down, but Matteo scoops up a handful of the things that's nearly as big as the entire pile. So much for his crackers.

"Seeing you with a child is like watching a dog walk around on its hind legs," Icarus says flatly, but he's still curiously observing as if its the most fascinating thing he's ever been given permission to watch.

"That would be an Academy thing," Dimara says. "You learn to deal with kids or the kids deal with you."

"I was one of the kids dealing it out."

"How old? Under ten?"

"Seven when I started living there."

"So Valiant had you, then?"

He nods, and Dimara makes a face, something a tad upset, before she turns back to whatever she was doing, narrowly avoiding treading on one of Rina's feet. It's true, about the kids and how you deal with them, but the whole thing is curious. She may have been much older but the two of them were there at the same time.

And they both watched it burn down, too.

Matteo goes wiggling about on his lap in search of more crackers even though he's the one that's gone and eaten them all. He loops an arm around him to hold him still while Icarus stares at him like he's having an out of body experience, just tapping into the top layer of whatever the fuck it really was that you could call Soran's childhood. You deal with them or they deal with you, that's the reality. He learned how to deal.

And he's good at it. Dealing, adapting, living.

That's the name of the game with the hand he was dealt.

—

Ria likes it here better than she thinks she's liked most places.

The Capitol was too much, and Three most of the times was too little. This, arguably, is the smallest of the bunch, but it feels like more. It's a safe in-between. You can actually go outside at night, or any time of the day really, without feeling like something bad is going to happen.

If they're the worst that can happen out here, then what is there to fear, really? She's done with being scared.

And it's been several days now, maybe even a week. She's had so little to stress or worry about that she's almost lost track of time. There's still the matter of the future and where exactly in this place they're going to settle down, but that's not a pressing matter like her own death was.

It's been too long, like she said, and Ria wants to see the ocean.

She's never seen it before. Her parents, the dedicated hard-workers they were, never got to be the vacationing type. If they were it was weekend camping trips or nightly stays in an adjacent city. Never far enough where they had to worry about getting back at a moment's notice. Ria had been fine with that, back then. Most of the time she hadn't wanted to go anyway.

But this is home now, her life for the immediate future, and she wants to see it. She's been hearing it for days.

The dunes begin not far from the last row of houses, tall waving grass turning to just a bit of sand. She hauls herself up the first of them and crests the top of it panting like she just ran a marathon, her legs burning from top to bottom.

But there's the ocean, and that's a reward in itself.

The sun only has a few more minutes here, and then it's going to sink below the horizon. The water looks like it's on fire in every direction, the sky cast in shades of orange and red. It's as far as the eye can see no matter which way she looks. It's somehow nicer than she expected, with the gentle sound of the waves and the birds and the grass tickling at her ankles.

"That hill was brutal," Tarquin announces, joining her at the top of it. Unlike her he continues a few paces forward, where the grass ends and the sand properly begins, and kicks off his shoes. "Enjoying the view?"

He said he might come after her, but a little smile comes to her face at the thought that he actually did.

"It's nice."

Tarquin continues on his way, picking up his shoes into one hand. "C'mon."

She watches his retreating back. "Are you going to push me in?"

"I'm not Soran or Emmi, so no," he says over his shoulder. "Come on!"

She does. She toes off her own shoes and follows him through the sand, all the way down the beach and to the water's edge, where the tide rises almost all the way to their feet. It's just nice. There's no better way to describe it.

And if she does happen to stumble in up to her knees, it's no one's fault but her own.

—

"Just come with me," Emmi insists.

Tarquin gives her a suspicious look. She's been trying this for the past hour, at least. Since they've gradually started to acquire more things and find homes for them he's at least tried to get his life-semi organized, but it's difficult when someone intervenes every five minutes.

To be honest, he had thought she left. The door kept opening and closing, but she wasn't coming up to bug him.

Or at least she hadn't, until now.

"Why?" he asks finally.

"I think you'll appreciate it more than anyone else save for Ria, maybe, but I can't find her. So I'm going to show you instead."

Okay, that's not suspicious at all. It says something about the trust he has in her that he follows her downstairs at all, outside and around the back of the house to the ramshackle shed tucked away at the edge of the trees. It's a place that she could very easily bury him in and no one would ever find him unless they really wanted to.

Emmi pulls the door open with a grating screech, peeking inside. "Okay good, they're still here."

He leans around her to get a look despite his better judgement trying to get him away from his probable burial spot. There's a small, fluffy pile tucked away in the corner right up against the door, and on top of that it's squeaking occasionally. At first he thinks it's one thing, but the longer he looks the more it turns into distinct movement, each one twitching on its own.

"Really?" he asks, slightly incredulous. As if this fluffy pile of kittens just turned up at their back door. Is that a coincidence he should hold dear? He had missed that level of company from Nyx, the quiet, food-thievery kind. That was the best type to have.

"Well, I haven't seen mom in the past day," Emmi says. "And there's five of them. So."

There really is. He can make out each one in the shadows though they still look as if they're one, a mish-mash of different colors, tiny bodies rising and falling in sleep.

And there's five of them.

If that's not fate, he doesn't know what is.

—

She's had a grand total of a day and a half in what she's considering her house.

It's small but not too small, and it's tucked onto the end of a quaint little block of houses with a clear path to the water at the very end of them all, complete with trees on either side. She very much feels like she's in some oddity fairytale if the protagonists were ever runaway, supposed to be dead murderers.

So not really a fairy tale at all.

She hears someone fiddling with the door long before anyone gets inside; it sounds like whoever it is experiences more trouble than they're going to admit. There's a whole handful of people out there who could get in silently and untroubled, namely Meritt fucking Trevall. She still hasn't properly absorbed the fact that somewhere in this little town is the brother of the woman dead at their hands. She'll cross that bridge when she comes to it.

Eventually growing tired of the noise, she pulls open the door unceremoniously. Icarus stumbles forward a foot and nearly crashes into her, hand raised as if he was fiddling about with her lock.

Figures.

"Having fun?" she asks.

"The most," he responds. "Hey, happy birthday. Tarquin didn't beat me, did he? He said he was going to beat me?"

Emmi eyes the clock. "He's probably not even awake. Why are you?"

"I just told you. I wanted to be the first."

"Could your ego not have handled coming in second?"

"Oh, absolutely not. So, happy birthday! We're attempting to bake something but you know. Give it a few hours. We're working on it."

"Yay," she deadpans. Icarus abandons her completely and nearly races back across the road, leaving her standing there in the doorway as he dives back into the house as if he just remembered leaving the oven unsupervised.

The cake, when she finally gets it six hours later, tastes absolutely like the handiwork of at least four people not knowing what they were doing, but it also doesn't taste like complete shit, so it's a win in her eyes.

Little victories, people.

—

Something arrives in a box for Icarus, several weeks later.

It's not a very big box, that's for sure. It's suspiciously unlabeled but it's given to him regardless, something about instructions and whatnot. It's just the typical process when you're supposed to be dead and not actively receiving mail.

No one else gets one, yet, he's just lucky to be the first.

It's not just one thing, but several. It's little trinkets, things from his parents house and a few that he had at the house in One, too. It's everything he was so used to seeing down to both of his parent's wedding rings, tucked away in a small box at the very bottom.

Pandora said she would do this once the entire country was done poking around in their business, he just didn't necessarily believe her. Getting all of this was one thing, getting it here was entirely different. An unmarked box not strictly addressed to him made it all the way out here because she ensured it would. Because she said so.

There's a note wrapped around the box, too. I'm working on the rest, it says. Everyone else's too.

Icarus knows what the plan is; two odd years and they might just be able to go back, have this not all be for nothing. At that point he may just be content here; who says he'll even want to go back even if he can?

It's hard to decide how he feels about this, even worse when he looks into the box and can see everything important left of his parents in the entrapment of his arms. He wants to feel nothing on some days when he dares to think about them. Others he wants to scream and cry and beat his fists against the wall.

That's just how it goes. Soran said it a while ago now, but it's still true. They were his parents and nothing can change that.

He's coping. Breathing. Learning how to be okay with that.

And one day he will be.

—

"Can I ask you a question?" Emmi inquires.

She's sitting so close to him with her legs a dangerous few centimeters from pinning him to the couch that Soran's not sure he really has an option here that involves saying no. For someone that has her own house now several weeks out she sure spends a lot of time not staying in it when she could instead be with someone else.

He sighs, leaning back into the cushions. "Go for it."

"Do you miss your mom like I miss my mom?"

"How do you miss your mom?"

"I just do," she says. "All the time, even when I'm not thinking about it. It's different with my Dad, you know. That's more raw, more recent, so obviously it hurts more, but she just hurts all the time, you know? Like losing a limb. I would know, right?"

She's cracked a smile, so he doesn't feel totally awful in his complete avoidance of the response. Now that he's had actual time to dwell on it without worrying about anything else, there's just so much of him that no one knows, that he's never been willing to offer up. At that point, when you've been alone for so long, it's self-defense. People, especially in One's fucked up hell of a Career system, took advantage of you if you didn't.

"It's weird, I guess," he says. "I was a lot younger than you. Sometimes I miss her but other times when I'm thinking about it I realize I can barely remember what she sounded like. That's not my fault, but I feel like shit for it. You spend almost twelve years completely alone and your brain just goes elsewhere."

There's too much inside him, way too much for most people to handle it. It's about time he fucking got some of it out, because if he keeps it in any longer he's going to explode, and someone's going to get caught when the detonation happens.

That's the facts, though. Twelve years, and he had no one and nothing. It's been literal weeks and he's said nothing back to Icarus since that night. He's said nothing leaning even vaguely interpersonal to anyone.

Emmi nudges him. "You're not that weird."

"That would mean more if it was coming from someone any less mentally fucked than I am."

She kicks him harder this time, square in the thigh, but she's smiling again. He's probably off the fucking deep end - they all are, really, but he's climbing back up. Slowly but steadily.

He'll see the top one day.

—

It looks as if she's walking into a very large, very empty warehouse.

"Hello?" she calls, praying for an answer. If not she's going to feel like just a little bit of a fool. She's heard enough to think that maybe this is a good idea, that she could fit very well in a place like this. This is apparently the biggest building in a fifty mile radius, and it looks mostly empty except for some storage and crates.

"Oh, so Luca was right. Three's really are all the same damn stereotype."

She whirls. One of the doors she had noticed immediately upon entry is open, now, and the doorframe is filled by a tall, thin woman who's orange hair is jarring in the midst of the mostly gray and white room. She knows her as Sentinel first, Audrel second. She really just needs to know her as a person and not as some maniacal, overly intelligent killing machine. Ria shouldn't be scared of her.

"Sorry?" she asks.

"Nothing. Luca just has annoyingly weird assumptions about basically everyone and he's infuriatingly right ninety-nine percent of the time. Unless it's about his own kid; he's usually wrong then."

"What?"

"Don't listen to me, I'm just rambling. I've spent what feels like the last seven years of my life listening to Mac talk about heart regeneration and cell-free therapy and fucking vesicles, whatever those even are, and it's driving me insane. Are you really a Three?"

"Uh," she says slowly, ignoring the truth for a moment. "Yes?"

"C'mon, then. You'll like this."

Ria thought this would be a good idea, and she's right. Audrel leads her through the door and down two flights of stairs into the earth, and into a tightly-packed, compact room that's absolutely filled to the brim with everything Ria wanted. Computers and gadgets, tables with clear works in progress, mechanical parts and tools. She wanted something she knew, and this is it.

"We mostly just use it for surveillance around town," Audrel explains. "But I like to build shit, too. I've been thinking about putting together some phones for you guys. Or whatever I get bored enough to build."

"Like a bionic arm or two?" Ria asks.

Audrel grins, teeth like a shark. "Occasionally. I can get you a key if you ever wanna come down here. Just be warned that Mac's asleep down here half the time and if not Ivy's usually trying to work on her own projects."

Mac's nice, from what she's experienced. Ivy's just all bright innocence, and looks so much like Audrel that it's like a jolt to the system. From what Ria understands Ivy's not related to either of them, not by blood, but they're the ones she calls mom and dad. They're family anyway, after she lost her own.

Ria nods. She wants that key and the familiarity that comes as a side deal.

If she's lucky she thinks she might get a few more things along with it.

—

And so the summer passes into autumn.

Tarquin was never much a fan of autumn before. With how busy school could get it meant putting theater more on the backburner until the next spring and summer all over again. And he liked school, don't get him wrong, but it just wasn't the same.

It's weird not going back to school like old times, and he doesn't even fully realize until September passes. There's all sorts of ways he could finish it out here, if he wanted. They've set up a school of-sorts for the kids here anyway. He just hasn't decided yet. The lack of a schedule is even stranger; he can do whatever he wants whenever he wants and no one says a single thing. He's still unsure of whether he likes the complete autonomy or not.

It's that lack of a recognizable life that almost makes him forget his birthday completely. Two hours after he wakes up, greeted by cold silence as per usual in the newly finished house, he realizes. He hasn't done a single thing and doesn't do any when he realizes, either. He's not sure what there is to do.

Seventeen's nothing special, really. You don't get any real recognition until you hit eighteen and people start calling you a viable adult.

Besides, no one knows. He's just never thought to tell anyone; a birthday was the last thing on his mind. Sure, Emmi's had seemed at least a little like a big deal, but that had been mid-summer and not long after they had gotten here. It was a reprieve from the whirlwind that their lives had been.

They're settled, now. He's on his own even if everyone else is just next door, a few paces down the road or across it.

Does he want to make a big deal out of it? His parents and friends always did. He had always liked having a day like that, but things were different now. He was different now.

Then again, what else is he supposed to do other than celebrate? Sit here and think about how he wasn't supposed to make it to seventeen?

No, he's not going to do that. Whatever he decides, he's going to enjoy today, and every other day after this that he possibly can because it's just that: his decision. It's his life.

And if he wants to have a birthday, he's going to.

—

This may come as a surprise, but Meritt's not as terrifying as Emmi thought he would be.

Or maybe he is, and there's just something wrong with her.

It's probably the latter.

She's choosing to think of this in a very specific way. Her cat likes him, and he's still small enough that anyone, let alone Meritt, could squash him under one foot. Most of all the resident child in the room doesn't just like him, he loves him. Emmi thinks that's mostly because it's Seren's child and the kid really didn't have a choice about it, but it's endearing. And it's hard to be fearful of Meritt when he's getting shadowed by a four year old.

Seren, for some reason, seems more terrifying now. It's the whole carefree, in your face attitude combined with the recent addition of pure unadulterated mother bear. If someone even touched a hair on Apollo's head the wrong way Emmi's pretty sure their face would be gone the next day.

Speaking of, oddly enough.

"You don't like, secretly hate me, do you?" she wonders, and Meritt looks right at her. He doesn't have to ask her what this is about.

"If I secretly did, why would I tell you?"

"Well I'd like some warning if you're going to kill me in my sleep one day."

"I've never actually done that, you know," he informs her. "I don't know why anyone thinks that."

"I have a few ideas," Seren says from the other room, tone tinged with amusement. Apollo comes tearing in now, shoes and coat and all, and just about dives into Meritt's lap. What's honest to god terrifying above all is how much he looks like Luca; sure, there's a bit of Seren there, but it's like he has a mini-me running around.

"What have you never done?" Apollo asks curiously. "Can we go outside?"

"Nothing. And sure thing."

Apollo needs no more encouragement than that to go sprinting full tilt out the door. Meritt follows at a much slower pace but eventually leaves Emmi alone in the living room. There's no way those two get into anything but mischief; Luca and Seren's son and Meritt goddamn Trevall. She's surprised the place is still standing.

"He doesn't hate you," Seren says, poking her head into the room. "Trust me."

"You sure about that?"

"Hundred percent. Carnelia went after him almost the same way she went after you, and came about as close in succeeding to both. I'd say he misses her about as much as you do."

That's to say zero, then. Sue her for feeling even a smidgen mad that she had a hand in murdering his sister. She was an awful, evil person, but she was still someone.

The cat goes winding past Seren's legs into the kitchen, snapping her out of it as Seren looks down at him. He trots away down the hall until he's out of view, but they're both staring after him.

Seren turns around. "You really named him Titan, didn't you?"

Emmi can't help the little smile that fights its way onto her face, but Seren is soon wearing a matching one.

"You know what, that's fucking fantastic," Seren decides. "I approve."

Yeah, so does she.

—

It's what he's determined is the worst day of the year.

And to think he almost forgot, too. How could he possibly forget? While he wishes he could even he couldn't get that lucky. Who's to say this is the worst one, anyway? It was last year. That doesn't mean it is forever.

Soran's been tromping around the house forever, now, or at least an hour. It's hard for someone else to match your mood when they don't know what's going on; he can sit here and mope all he wants but it's futile unless someone knows what's going on. Neither of the cats are even anywhere in sight to make him feel better, and any other time of day Calliope won't leave him alone. Forrest he's not surprised by, so much. That cat has evidently absorbed a rough half of Soran's personality and spends most of his time gnawing on Icarus' things.

Not to say Soran does that, or anything.

If he's being honest, he doesn't even know what the date was when he found out his parents are dead. Maybe that's why he's still determining this day as the worst one.

"How do you plan on celebrating become a viable adult tomorrow?" Soran asks, perching on the side of the couch that Icarus is resting against. There are so many appropriate answers someone could give to that, but he can't come up with a single one.

"It was a year ago today," he says. "And I almost forgot."

"You mean like…?"

"Yeah. Exactly that."

Soran hasn't had an overwhelmingly positive or negative reaction in any regard, which he actually appreciates. He's not sure he can handle anything right now that's too overblown in any direction.

"The day before your birthday, huh?" he says eventually. "That's a ruiner if I've ever heard one."

"You're telling me. I'm beginning to suspect she died the day before because she didn't want me spending it sitting in the hospital with her. So instead I just spent it sitting in bed feeling sorry for myself."

"Well, if that's what you wanna do tomorrow, just let me know. You know I don't care either way."

Icarus twists around to look at him. Soran never waits for people to tell him things, never asks for permission. He just does things without asking and without caring if there are repercussions attached to it. It's enough to give him a heart attack at least twice a week if Soran wasn't so good at squirming his way out of things.

It seems very open-ended. He's letting Icarus decide how this day goes and how tomorrow follows it. It's been months, still, but he honestly wonders sometimes if Soran has no idea how to say the words I love you so he just expresses it in every way possible without even realizing.

"I think I'm just gonna go for a walk," he says. It's starting to get bitterly cold out, and he loathes it with every fiber of his being, but he wants the air, the freedom. He might feel a little better if he has that. He grabs a jacket and gloves and even struggles his way into a pair of boots, but Soran is still sitting on the end of the couch when he's finished, just watching.

Waiting for what Icarus wants, because he doesn't know.

"Well, are you coming with me or not?" he asks. He himself had no idea what he wanted when he got up, whether he wanted to be alone or not. He knows now. It feels like that's something that he has an answer for even when everything else in the world seems so confusing.

Soran smiles, and gets up after him.

It's not confusing anymore.

—

Everyone else gets a box, at some point or other. Soran gets an envelope.

He doesn't have any family items of worth or any at all, for that matter, so a box would be pointless. The envelope is slightly worrying to say the least, even more so considering Celia walks in through the front door and drops the thing on the table with about as much subtlety as she does everything else, which is to say none at all. Everything she says or does feels akin to a brick in the face.

She leaves with no mention of her child or him ever babysitting it, though, which is nice. People have finally started to take advantage of his ability to keep a child alive for more than five minutes on his own.

There's not much room in the envelope save for the few papers inside it, clipped together. There's writing covering every inch of every paper, hand-written. Apparently though he may not be able to get a box of familial belongings he still has Pandora out there, willing to write him letters like they're from the Dark Days.

It feels like small talk, all the way through. There are a lot of details about the in effect two year plan, and it confuses him to no end. Does he think she can actually get the Presidency? Sure. She's more than capable of it.

It's the after that's worrying. She can win it all she likes, but can she really bring them back? Presidents in this country used to be able to do whatever the hell they want - that's not so much the case anymore.

And she's not invincible, though the letter may be framed that way. What he can understand from it is that she's going to try, and that's really all he can hope for.

There's something near the end about writing back; if she got a letter here unscathed then there's no doubting he could get one back. What is he supposed to say, though? Letters are for people who actually know what to write, for articulately expressed emotions.

He should though, shouldn't he? She's still trying now just as hard as she tried before this all went to shit.

God, maybe he is going soft. He should really write her back.

First he just needs to figure out what to say.

—

Ria doesn't have very many sleepless nights anymore.

She's doing a lot better; she knows they all are. But a bad night every once in a while is more of an inevitability than anything else - she had those before all of this happened. If she didn't get them anymore she'd think she was permanently broken.

Despite her better judgement she finds herself heading across the road once she sees the light on. Most of the time like this she spends alone, letting herself wind back down. No one else is usually awake to join, at least not very often. Tarquin sleeps through the night now, mostly. She can't go next door to bug him.

It's stupid, the anxiety talking, but something about her walking in on whichever one of Soran or Icarus is awake at four in the morning feels like asking to get beat to death. Like they'd do it and go about their morning like nothing ever happened.

Yeah, this is the same anxiety that's keeping her awake for no clear reason that she can see.

Soran's at the stove when she inches open the door and slips inside, and Calliope is on her instantly, meowing up such a storm that she's surprised the whole town doesn't hear her. No one else even moves a muscle - Soran stays doing whatever he's focused on, and Forrest from his perch on the counter stays laser-focused on whatever food is being prepared, only his tail occasionally flopping back and forth.

Ria sheds her coat and scoops Callie up off the floor, who doesn't stop meowing until she's being held. If Ria had the gall she'd ask Icarus when their personalities merged.

She might, one day.

"Are you making a grilled cheese right now?" she asks, stepping into the kitchen.

Soran flips what is most definitely a grilled cheese over in the pan on the stove. "Why does that sound like judgement?"

"It's not. Just wondering."

"Why? Do you want one?"

She doesn't say anything, because this is routine. The fact of the matter is, Ria never sits up with Tarquin this late— early, really, unless he asks. Emmi and Icarus never bother anyone else - they don't even turn the lights on. Ria wouldn't wake anyone up even if she thought she was dying.

Soran's the only one that does anything. When he's feeling the same way she's feeling right now he gets up and does something to take his mind off it. Sometimes he's pretending to read a book even if it's upside down, sometimes he's watching something on the projector. A lot of the time he's making food that she won't ask for and gives her half of it without comment. That's just how it is. They eat or they sit there in silence until one or both of them decide they're better and ready to go back to sleep, and then they do. Just like that.

Somehow, despite the odds, they've come to an agreement. They feel the same way and they sit in solidarity with it until it goes away.

It never will, not permanently. But until then she'll cross the street when she sees a light on and eat half the grilled cheese he slides across the table because that's what they do.

It feels weird to admit they have a them type of thing, even if it is the silent bond of shared trauma when your own brain won't let you sleep it off.

But Ria's okay with that, oddly enough.

She's glad for it.

—

Sometimes Tarquin misses his friends so much that it hurts to breathe.

They don't even know he's alive; they think he offed himself and have no evidence to the contrary. He's hopeful that they will, one day. He'll get to hug them all again and tell them he's sorry.

For now he has this, and it's not as bad as he expected. There's more people that care than he would have anticipated.

Most of those people consist of the nine twenty-somethings whose experiences are the same but still so vastly different. They're good people who may have done terrible things the same way he did, and he's grateful to have them. They understand - not everything, but a lot of it.

And they're all so damn nice, too, if you can handle scathing remarks from Blair and Celia once in a while, or Tanis when they've given up for the day. They're good company to keep, to talk to, to spend time with.

One day Tarquin would just like to feel the same way they do. He'd like to harbor and display the pure, genuine kindness that Kelsea and Rory just always have, with their families but also with complete strangers. Kelsea hugs him all the time like she's known for years, often times when she can tell he's feeling down.

It hurts a lot, worse than other times, when he sees Vance and Rooke. Both of them didn't just bring their families into this, but an entire gaggle of friends too. They have everything Tarquin thought he would have for the rest of his life.

The thing is, though, the more time he spends there, the more he's integrated. They get used to his presence. Suddenly, Rooke's friends actually like him, almost without blinking. He thinks Vance only likes him because he agrees to let him go to town painting his house, but maybe Vance liked him all along? They're the same person in a different upbringing, a different body. Why wouldn't they get along?

Vance, most of all, has shown him that someone so similar can actually get through all of this, despite their differences. He's survived it.

And they're all doing so well, Vance included. Sure, it's been nine years, but that's not always long enough for some people. For some it takes forever.

Tarquin doesn't want his to take forever, but he no longer feels like it will. He's got shining examples of why it won't, and in a twist of fate, all of these people to bring him through it.

One day, once this is all over, they're going to get one hell of a thank you.

And Tarquin's going to get there.

—

For a long time now Emmi's had difficulty looking at herself in the mirror.

She spent so many years loving herself; it was the calling of a narcissist, but there was nothing wrong in her eyes with loving yourself, especially if no one else would. She had to put herself first.

That was the one thing she thinks Winnie got without even blinking. They prioritized themselves in the early days with the exception of each other.

Since everything it's been difficult to do that. Focusing on herself most days means delving into dangerous territory, the darkest thoughts and feelings that exist in her brain. She wants to be able to look at herself in the mirror again and not hate herself.

She doesn't look totally, worryingly different. Maybe a little thinner around the face. There are scars peppered here and there across it too from that damn windshield - even her getting her arm up in time couldn't save everything. There's one at the corner of her mouth noticeable whenever she smiles, which is more often now she feels. A few scattered about her hairline. One dangerously close to her left eye.

Her body's worse, but no one's seen that. Her stomach and side is a mess of scars and extra tissue from the holes they sewed back up as best they could. It'll get better with time, that she knows. She just has to give it that.

It's her hair that she's spent the most time on, of all stupid things. The past month has been a routine of her scrubbing it out in both the shower and sink, and the pink has gradually faded from it the harder she works. She dunks her head again into the sink today and afterwards stands there until she's dried it through.

And finally, it's gone.

It's a strange feeling. She hasn't looked entirely normal in years now. For the longest time that was something to embrace, but for now Emmi just needs to be her. Nothing else. No alterations, nothing to hide behind.

Maybe one day she'll go back to it. Tarquin's certainly offered enough, though she has no idea where he'd get the stuff around here, especially with no Tycho to ask after. She has no doubt though that he'd find a way if she asked. That's all it takes. For all she knows instead of the pink it'll be purple one day, a secret little tribute. Perhaps it'll be nothing at all; she has no idea, and maybe never will if that day doesn't present itself in the future.

For now, though, she's fine with just being Emmi. Slightly scarred, less than perfect Emmi and all the baggage and bad memories that come along with her.

She had good, too. She still does.

If the purple ever comes, she thinks, it'll be on a day where it's only the good left at all.

—

"Alright, we're gonna have a talk," Icarus announces, sitting down on the back porch with a thud.

There's no one there. No one in sight, not even in earshot.

But he needs to have this talk.

He had another dream about her last night. Not even an inherently bad one, nothing like being pulled into the earth and buried alive, but it kept him up for a long while after. He hadn't had the heart to wake Soran up for something that wasn't even bad, so he had laid there and resolutely not moved, staying in utter silence until Soran had rolled over, nearly onto him, and then woken up anyway.

And he hadn't even mentioned it.

There's no forgetting something like this, but there's moving on.

"I can't really tell you to leave me alone or anything, 'cause that's my own brain," he says. "It's just not getting any better. I don't want to live the rest of my life only having the bad shit stuck in my head. It wasn't all bad."

Very little of it was bad, really. Even stuck in the hospital they had their moments, and not once did he ever regret loving her. He still doesn't.

She'd want him to be happy, right? She always told him that before.

"I don't get why people say you have to let things like this go," he continues. "I can't right? I don't want to. Who the fuck would I be if I let this go?"

There's no letting go of something that impacted you so deeply. There are parts of him now that wouldn't be the same way they are if she hadn't been in his life. For all he knows he wouldn't have been the type to survive.

"I wanna be the type of person that just lives, you know?" he asks. "I just wanna live. I don't want to be scared all the time. Every day I wake up and I'm terrified of losing every little thing I have the same way I lost you. And I don't want that to be forever."

That's not even living. He's stuck in a phase where everything in his possession turns to ashes in the palm of his hands.

Nothing has, as of late, but that hasn't changed how his brain works. He's still convinced that something is going to fade away or be taken away from him because that's how his life works. It's how it always has.

He doesn't want it to be that way anymore.

"If you'll let me, I'd just like to live," he says. And work on my own head, he wants to add, but doesn't. She can let him be and be happy for him and he can still hold onto a little piece of her and remember it.

Because there's nothing wrong with that.

He won't live in the past, but he also deserves a piece of it, too.

That very past created his hopeful future.

—

Soran's hand really does never go back to one hundred percent.

It doesn't really hurt though, either. Sometimes there's a bit of numbness, and his pinky doesn't stretch out the same as his other fingers, but you'd never be able to notice if not for the scarring on his wrist. Not that he cares about that any, but he knows who does.

Icarus will just have to get over it one day.

He thinks his two previously broken fingers still look a little crooked, too, but no amount of staring will tell him if he's right.

Icarus comes tromping up the stairs and down the hall, breezing past the bathroom door without a word. He calls him back, which only results in Icarus backtracking and then pausing in the doorway to look at him, confused.

"Do you think my fingers are crooked?"

Icarus grabs him by the wrist, rotating it back and forth. He's absolutely freezing, and he'll attribute that to his untelligence telling him it was smart to go walk around in the negatives.

He stares just as intently as Soran feels like he was. "If they are, should they not be?"

"I'm pretty sure my fingers shouldn't be crooked, no."

Of all the people to ask about this, Icarus was certainly the worst, because Icarus doesn't tend to care about the state of his hands so long as they're holdable. Blood, grime, open wounds, broken fingers - there's not much that phases him in that department.

"I'm not sure why you care," Icarus says. "Your side is way worse anyway."

"I don't."

"Alright," Icarus agrees, though it doesn't sound like he really believes it. He does a neat sidestep into the bathroom up to his back and then wiggles both of his positively glacial hands under each side of Soran's shirt. He flinches, but there's really nowhere to go except into the shower, and nothing would change even if he did.

"You're an asshole," he tells him, but Icarus seems perfectly content with the title and doesn't move an inch from where he's planted his face in the back of Soran's shoulder. He holds his hand up to the light again, but can't pick anything different apart. It's just weird, having these little differences that no one can notice, not even yourself, but that are most definitely there. The scars are the only noticeable thing.

And it's like Icarus said, the other ones are way worse anyway. The worst of them are right underneath where Icarus has chosen to lay his right hand, fingers lined up right where the knife went in, where they cut him open in the hospital while he was out. Said hands, despite his best efforts, aren't getting any warmer very fast.

Icarus lifts his head up. "Stop smiling at my misfortune."

"I'm not smiling."

"Sure you're not," he replies, removing a hand to poke at Soran's jaw even though he attempts to move his head away. "Dimples are nothing if not evidence."

He doesn't even know what he's smiling at, because it's not what Icarus has claimed. Since when does he just feel like smiling, though? Never, until now? It feels good to. It feels okay to admit that.

The scars are one thing. Those aren't going away, not ever. Not with the damage they did to him in such a short period of time.

But he's still smiling, and people can call him crazy for that, but if he is it couldn't have been that bad, right?

—

Ria, generally speaking, chooses not to ask whenever she hears something concerning.

It's a safe, very reliable option that's gotten her this far in life. Tarquin in the kitchen, or anyone for that matter, is not an exception to the rule. For some reason he seems particularly bad at it, though, too easily distracted by other things. If he's looking for a new hobby to replace theater, it's not this. But she'll let him try.

This time it's a whole string of swears, preceding the sound of awkward, hopping footsteps. It's so much that if Ria didn't know better, she'd have thought someone else joined him in there.

There's no one else there, though, just as she suspected. There is, however, blood.

She goes cold all over, still swinging herself off the couch to get a better look. She doesn't want to. There's a knife from the block between his feet; she missed that noise altogether. There's not much blood - some on the counter and a few droplets on the floor where the knife hit. There's a lot more all over his hand, what's seeping out despite his best efforts to hold it in.

Tarquin looks at her and offers a cheeky, exaggerated smile. "Can you get me a towel, or something? I won't make you do anything else."

She's way ahead of him on that. "What did you do?" she asks, avoiding looking to her right. She roots around for a spare drying towel and considers throwing it at him from across the island.

"Hand slipped," he explains. "Sorry. I don't think it's that bad."

If it's not that bad, then why is it bleeding the way it is? Ria doesn't even want to find out, but she also can't just throw the towel at him. She'd like to think she's evolved further than that.

The blood hasn't made her want to die on sight, so that's a good thing. That's progress. She creeps around the island towards him, avoiding the splatter on the floor.

"You're never allowed in or near a kitchen again," she warns him, keeping her eyes pinned one one of the cabinet handles instead of looking.

"Oh, come on. I'm trying. It's not bad."

"That sounds like Soran talking, and I think he'd agree with me."

"Probably," Tarquin surmises. "Give me that."

She doesn't. Ria does the last thing she wants to do and wrenches his arm off, exposing the blood that had been trapped underneath his palm and the surprisingly shallow, not very long cut in the middle of it. She loops the towel over his hand and back under before she can focus on it for too long and brings it back around until there's nothing left to see, tying off the end of it.

Tarquin stares at her. "Are you going to throw up?"

"If I do, it's not intentional."

He reaches up again and nudges at her hand repeatedly with his cleanest finger. She's still got a death-grip on the knot she's made as if she's suddenly unable to let go, but she knows why. Blood makes her nauseous enough on its own - it being his blood, or any of them, really, is even worse.

Tarquin steps back from her, waiting patiently for her hand to drop. He replaces it with his own as soon as she has. The towel is covering everything now. If there wasn't some on the counter and a knife on the floor between them it would be like nothing ever happened.

There's the tiniest trickle of it on her hand, too, a single drop that must have beaded down her palm. She turns the sink on at full blast and scrubs it off.

"I'm going to see Mac real fast," Tarquin says. "I'll come right back after and clean this up. Don't worry about it."

"No, I'll do it." She takes a deep breath - it's not that much to deal with. "Just go."

He gives her a curious look, but obediently files out the door and closes it behind him. It's really nothing that bad, and if she doesn't do it the cat is going to get curious and spread it throughout the whole of the house. That she's not prepared to deal with at all.

But she dealt with this. She didn't immediately faint or run away in terror and better yet, she didn't cause it either. Or maybe she did, continuously allowing him in her kitchen. She was asking for it.

She wipes up the blood and the spray on the counter from the sink and by the time she's finished Vector is inspecting the damp floor with hugely curious yellow eyes, stepping across it gingerly as if aware of each foot being set down and the mark he might be making it.

There's no blood anymore. She got rid of it.

She's finally learned how to do that.

—

"I'm going to give you this early," Ria announces, dropping a very shoddily wrapped present practically in Tarquin's lap, and then she leaves.

Distantly, he hears the front door open and close.

"That's not how Christmas works," he says to nothing and no one in particular, but Cordelia meows at him. At least someone gets it. And it's not like he even really knows how Christmas works either. He got informed a rough month ago that they actually celebrated legitimate holidays out here, or not if you weren't interested. He's sure people elsewhere across Panem have re-adopted the traditions from before the Dark Days, but it's so sudden and nice that it's a jolt to the system.

What he does know is that you're supposed to open gifts on the actual day, not five before. The only issue now is that Ria's gone and he doesn't want to chase after her waving a present like an absolute lunatic.

He gets to work at pulling the wrapping part. Cordelia picks up the largest piece that floats to the floor and leaves with it before he can stop her, but he at least manages to stomp a foot down on the length of ribbon before she can swallow it whole.

The wrapping almost disguised the otherwise very normal shape, but it's a book. A very long, lengthy book, with a thick leather cover so heavy overall that it's no wonder it hurt when she dropped it on him.

It's old, that he can tell instantly. The cover is slightly faded and there's a place at the bottom left corner where the spine is starting to pull up.

There's something about a collection, something about Shakespeare, but he pulls the book open to the bright orange tab that's sticking out the side of it about halfway through. It's small enough that it only lines up with one bit of text, but he figures that's the only one he needs.

Let me be that I am and seek not to alter me.

Tarquin recognizes that. They never actually got around to tackling Much Ado About Nothing, but he was one of the few that got through it before anyone ever told him to. Happy endings didn't have much of a place in plays like theirs, turns out. This one had one of the only happy endings that Shakespeare ever gave them.

There's no other tab, no dog-eared page or bookmark pointing him elsewhere in the entire collection. Just that play and its happy ending, that line in particular.

She's long gone by now, but Tarquin looks to the door as if expecting her to come back anyway.

Finding copies of all of these online was difficult enough some days - getting an actual, physical copy bound together like this, especially in relatively good shape, was practically unheard of. He has no idea where she could have gotten it, and with this lot, he probably doesn't want to.

It's a complete rarity, and she gave it to him. She wanted him to see exactly what she had; the original, unaltered version.

He sets the book down on the table, crumples up all of the paper into the trash can, and heads off to give her what it probably going to be the longest hug she's ever received in her life.

And it might just be his, too.

—

Emmi knew the rules of this.

Lay low for two years, give or take. Maybe permanently, but that was all resting on the chance that Pandora either got the Presidency or didn't. If she did, she could fix this. If she didn't then this was permanently home, which Emmi wouldn't really mind at all.

Not that she had seen any of the broadcasts, but Pandora was apparently a fantastic actor, and had the whole pretending to be dead shtick down to a science. No one knew.

Her keeping up the act also meant that she couldn't just show up here any time she liked to check in on them.

No, that was someone else's job.

Emmi knew this would be the case if this all worked out, but still. Seeing Ferrox and Cambria even exist within a thousand miles of Luca just did not absorb well in her brain, but she wasn't alone in that case. No one could witness it and take it seriously. It was one thing to spend time around murderers in general when you were one anyway, and it was another to spend time with someone who had shot you in the head and nearly killed you.

But it's not like Emmi would know, or anything.

She left it alone, at that. They checked in, made sure everything was fine. They would report back to Pandora eventually, confidentially. That was it.

But Emmi had a plan. A three day in the making, goaded on by Icarus sort of plan. She had a day left, or so she thought. They were leaving tomorrow.

And then she runs directly into him. And by directly, she means directly.

Emmi knew the kids were here, but she hadn't seen them. The part of the plan she hadn't figured out was how to find him, exactly. She hadn't accounted for the fact that she could stumble upon him out of nowhere, and then directly into him. She collides with him in a doorway in the middle of the damn town, caught swinging herself up the steps too fast at the same time he's walking out, and contemplates dying the second she looks up and sees him.

Atlas, much to his credit, doesn't have that typical "oh, she's going to kill me, isn't she?" look on his face that most strangers do when they meet her. He looks very unperturbed at having nearly been knocked over.

"Hi," she says. All of the supposed plan just got knocked out of her. She's never hated Icarus more.

"Hi," he says back, but at least he doesn't sound like he wants to drop dead. She hates him too, while she's at it. Who cares if she doesn't know him? It's just based on the principle of him acting like this is totally normal.

"Sorry," she says. "I totally was looking, actually, I just —"

"It's fine," he interrupts, but at least smiles. "You're good. And I actually wasn't looking, so no worries."

Emmi chances a look around, but there's no one in sight that she's actually worried about seeing. There's a genuine chance Icarus is hiding in a bush somewhere watching this with binoculars, but she can kill him for that later if need be.

Finally, he goes to move, and Emmi backs off the steps. "Sorry, I gotta go. Sister needs help with something. But again, sorry for nearly running you over."

Oh God, he's leaving. She's fucked this up massively, whatever this even was. And he didn't even stand a chance at bowling her over; there's a solid chance he's taller than both Soran and Icarus but he doesn't look as if he'd even hurt a fly and enjoy it.

"Hey!" she shouts after him, and he miraculously turns back around in the road to look at her again, hands stuffed into his pockets. "You're leaving tomorrow, right?"

He nods. "Why?"

"Are you coming back?"

"Every three months now, I think. You know. To check-in."

She nods too, silent. He doesn't move save to shift about on his feet, back and forth. As she watches, though, a smile appears on his face and it grows by the second. It doesn't look like something he does very often.

"Why?" he asks, voice half a laugh.

Emmi shrugs. "No reason," she says casually, turning to go. "See you in three months!"

She puts all the energy she has in herself not to turn back around, but when she goes she can hear him laughing behind her, unmoving.

To be honest, she thinks that's a sound she could get used to.

—

Icarus goes to sleep, wakes up, and in that time absolutely nothing is wrong.

It's not like it hasn't happened before. He's slept easily plenty of times. This is the first morning though that feels like complete peace when he wakes up. He's safely tucked away in bed and wearing one too many layers, away from the bitter cold and the snow that was supposed to have fallen overnight.

Even stranger yet is the fact that Soran's still here. Icarus is lying on his side, closest to the wall, but can tell he's still there and fidgeting like there's no tomorrow. Either he's just woken up and hasn't struggled his way free yet or he's feeling particularly generous with his time; he doesn't usually stick around long after he's woken up. He wasn't born to actually sit there and let himself properly rest.

"What're you doing?" Icarus mumbles, rolling over. Without opening his eyes he knows Soran's sat up some, judging by the knee he's getting to his abdomen. He tugs himself up a few inches and flops over his legs, onto Soran's chest, and then puts his head back down.

"Well," Soran says pointedly. "I was relaxing."

They're both still completely boneless and sunken in too far into the mattress, so he still undoubtedly is. With some of his shoulders exposed he can feel how cold it is even through his sweater, the air frigid even with the heat cranked up.

"It's cold."

"Why do you think I'm still here?"

Neither of them should get up today, then. They have no obligations, never do. One of them at some point will have to get up to feed the cats, though Calliope is half asleep on his pillow and Forrest has taken advantage of the cracked open door to come and go as he pleases, though right now he looks very intent on wiggling his way underneath the blankets. Icarus frees a hand to lift the edge of them up and Forrest disappears into the darkness under the cover. He'll be getting his feet attacked in a minute, but he's used to it.

Soran hasn't tried to escape out from under him, and when Icarus looks up his eyes are closed again. Maybe he's more content than ever to stay here, as per Icarus' wishes. It definitely doesn't look like he's going anywhere anytime soon.

Forrest, much to his surprise, curls up in the space left between the crook of Soran's leg and Icarus' right side, nose just poking out from the blankets. He must be protesting the weather too, or else he wouldn't be so agreeable.

Icarus is in the same boat, but he's just happy, weather or not. He's happy for the calm and for the sleep, for the contentedness in him now from his toes all the way up.

Sleep is already coming back, so he closes his eyes and lets it happen. It's easy to let peace be the thing that overtakes him now.

And if that's wrong, if that's fucked up in any way, shape or form, then he doesn't care whatsoever.

—

Of course he left the damn door open.

Soran's used to these nonsense, trivial things that aren't nonsense to him. Icarus only leaves the door open because he's from money, too much of it, and was raised in a house that didn't get cold at a moment's notice, even from a two inch crack in the door.

Soran watches him for a minute. He's put on boots and draped a coat over his shoulders to do nothing more than stand at the bottom of the porch, poking his foot over and over again into the snow drift that's accumulated in front of the stairs. He's never seen this much snow in his life; One never got this bad no matter how hard it tried, and from what he knows, the Capitol was similar. Pretty, expensive people didn't tend to live in places that could get buried so easily.

He doesn't mind it. He likes the change in an otherwise static world.

Soran edges the door open further but Icarus pays him no mind, if he even notices at all. The crunch of the snow underneath his feet appears to be a sufficient distraction. Much to Soran's surprise he doesn't look disgruntled by its presence, just curiously tired from having crawled out of bed to investigate.

He steps back - he needs coffee, for this, and starts the machine before retaking his place in the doorway. Icarus has flattened enough snow to make it to the ground, and is standing in his own self-made circle, the surrounding snow up to his knees.

There must be watching eyes on him for too long; Icarus blinks in surprise when he turns around and notices their proximity to one another.

His self-awareness in correspondence to his surroundings clearly hasn't gotten any better. It's a good thing there's nothing out here threatening him.

Icarus opens his mouth. Soran isn't quite close enough to slap a hand over his mouth, so he speaks first.

"I do love you, you know," he says. "Or at least I hope you do."

Icarus' jaw clacks shut. Soran's not sure he meant that to come out; if that's the case, there's no telling what the original plan was. Something less earth-shattering, certainly, and much more tactful. Months and months later, and this is what he says?

"Sorry," he continues, unsure of what it is he's even apologizing for. He doesn't like apologizing for things.

"What are you sorry for?" Icarus asks, the very question he was dreading. He shrugs, because there's no other alternative. He's not sure what he's supposed to say. The only thing he could possibly be sorry for, realistically, is how long it took to say it, but Icarus was never mad about that.

His brain is melting down again. He can feel it about to come out of his ears.

Icarus hurries back up the steps with a smile on his face and wraps both arms around him. "Hey, relax," he says, a laugh hidden in his voice. "I did know. You never said it, but I heard you anyway. Do you get that?"

"Yeah." He thinks he does, anyhow. There's no use saying otherwise.

"So we're good, then," Icarus says. "Right?"

"Right."

Icarus kisses him, somehow still retaining warmth despite the air around him. "Love you too."

It wasn't because he didn't want to, especially not if Icarus could tell the whole time anyway. Soran knows what it feels like, but it's too easy for people to throw around. When you haven't heard those words since you were seven, maybe, you learn not to let go of them so easily. It's too frightening to do otherwise.

Icarus hugs him. He relaxes inch by inch until the tension is gone from his shoulders, until the feeling of terror is gone altogether. Nothing's wrong with this.

He can admit it. He can say it aloud. He can allow himself to have this even if the world says he doesn't deserve it, because he's never cared what they think. They're not what matters.

He's got what matters, and no one's taking that away from him.

—

Ria likes to think that Christmas was a success.

With no definition to read from it's a difficult decision that ultimately ends with some sort of satisfaction. Everyone seemed happy and alert, festive to a point. She hadn't known what was appropriately festive or not, but apparently cutting trees down was a thing. She might have to do that next year, if she could find one that would fit through the front door.

It was easy. Her stomach was still a smidgen past over-full even as she made her way back home for the night, and her eyelids were drooping, but the buzz from the day was keeping her awake.

The other four had somehow gotten out before she had, and upon realizing that a stone that felt an awful lot like dread had sunken into her gut before she had shaken it away. There wasn't a single person in this town that went out of their way to make her talk - they conversed when Ria wanted, and they didn't push otherwise. If she wanted to sit in a corner and observe for six odd hours, they would let her. It hadn't taken her very long to realize that she was alone, but instead of fleeing like her feet wanted her to she did a slow, ambling lap around the premises to confirm it.

No one was there, but she passed by the back door and the promise of a quick exit and lingered, instead. Ria allowed herself to pour another drink and snag a second sweet that she didn't have a name for and watched. People talked, people celebrated. They lived.

When she left it was only because her eyelids were drooping; it was well past midnight, and they had all been up since the crack of dawn.

She hadn't had a bad thought about this in awhile. Her mom had loved the idea of special holidays, even if they didn't get to celebrate them. Instead of that memory rearing its ugly head all she felt was contentedness - her mom would be happy that she was allowing herself to be, too.

She completes the icy trudge back to the house and unlocks the front door. Vector detaches himself from the top of the couch at her sudden arrival, stretching out his front legs. He's not the only shadow in the living room, though. Ria quickly notices four others, almost unnoticeable in the darkness. If the cat hadn't been there she's not sure she would have noticed them at all.

They came back here, instead of returning to their own houses.

She blinks, as if they'll disappear, but as predicted the silence stretches on thinner. She closes the door soundlessly behind her without so much of a flinch from any of them, all asleep. They have to have been that way for some time now. If they came here directly after leaving, and had been waiting ever since...

They may have left her to her own deceives, to the small amount of peace she had found while out, but they waited for her to return to them.

Ria waits for the surprise, but it doesn't come. They're all thoroughly out, taking up almost every bit of space in her living room. She's halfway up the stairs when she pauses, taking in the sight behind her. Even Vector has curled back up on top of the couch as if to say this is the right place.

And it is.

She returns to the living room, snagging a spare quilt from the hall closet, and claims the only space they've left in the armchair by the window. It doesn't seem like much, but it was deliberate. They knew what she would come back to.

That's what people do when you're theirs and they are yours.

Ria drawls the last of the curtains closed, shuttering off the stripes of light that have casted across the living room, and curls up.

In less than a minute, she's gone.

---

There was a routine going on, and he was aware of it.

A hole in a group of five tended to be more obvious than most things, these days. People here traveled in pairs and packs, and very rarely anything in-between. When one of a group wandered, people noticed.

He's alone for just long enough to get his thoughts going, and that's when someone finds him. Someone had the forethought to screen the back porch in, and there's a heat lamp in the corner by his feet that he could kick over if he was feeling particularly cruel towards himself.

Luckily, he's not.

It's Tarquin that comes looking, or rather the one that finds him. He could've put a bet on that and made a lot of money. There's a whole crowd of people packed into one area, and Ria couldn't move through them with the amount of ease it would take to get there first. The last he saw of Icarus he had a drink in hand, though he looked gleeful about it, and if he wanted to make even more money he could clearly bring to mind an image of Emmi practically pouring liquor down his throat to see how bad she could get him before Soran had noticed.

But oh, Soran had noticed. He had beaten her to that punch.

It's a lot in there. He's used to it by now. He wanted a few minutes to himself and has taken twenty, now, the notebook and pen consuming almost fifteen.

The writing hasn't been going so well, but he was trying.

"Emmi is doing unspeakable things to Icarus' alcohol tolerance," Tarquin says, instead of asking what he's doing. It's pretty obvious.

"What tolerance?"

Tarquin hums - probably agreement, and there goes a handful of cash Soran could've made tonight. The one and only time the five of them had gotten anywhere near trashed together was more like the four of them, because he's pretty sure Ria had spent half the night going all watchful guardian on them before they had blacked out.

He was only pretty sure because he couldn't actually remember. You'd think he'd know better.

"You good?" Tarquin asks. He hasn't invited himself to sit down.

He nods. Tarquin watches him for a moment as if searching for a lie that doesn't exist before disappearing back into the house. The noise and the bodies swallow him whole.

Ria's next, about ten minutes later, although he can feel how different it is. Tarquin told her where he was, and she hasn't come to check on him, or at least that wasn't her sole intention.

She does sit down and curls both legs underneath herself, nursing a glass between both hands. If he's going strong on the bets, it's not alcohol. Not when everyone else has tipped off that ledge already. The whole celebratory thing is starting to grate on him, but it's not entirely awful. He just wanted some time out here with no one else around.

Ria doesn't count in that way. Even though it sounds harsh it isn't meant to be - she can tell if he wants to talk, and if he does, she speaks up. For now she's silent, and lets him scribble away a few more lines and then cross things out. Five minutes later and he's made it almost no further and has only a fractured beginning, if you could even call it that.

Yes, I'm trying to write something. If you could excuse all of this for future reference and never address it again, whether it's in writing back or you have the unfortunate luck to see my face again, please don't.

Before we get any further I'd like to clarify that I've never done this before, and I'm only doing it because I feel bad. Are you proud of that? You made me feel bad enough to write you something back. Congratulations.

He sighs. "You know, if I ever finish this goddamn thing, you're gonna have to proofread it."

"Me?"

"Well, no one else is here," he says with a shrug. That's what he says, but what he really means is that she's the only one who will just look at it and okay it rather than pick through it with a fine tooth comb and wield every other thing he says in it against him one day. If Icarus even tries to read it before it's done he's pitching it in the fireplace at home.

She nods, agreeing easily. "Do you need anything?" she asks, getting to her feet. She's taken up the time she needed away from the crowd, and she's going back in. He's weirdly, dumbly proud of her for that.

"A writing lesson."

"I'll ask around," she tosses over her shoulder, but she won't. They both know that.

It's more minutes than he thought until the next one. Emmi comes ripping out of the back door with all the force of a hurricane and then nearly runs into his chair. She's shouting at someone still in the house, laughter a breathless afterthought. Happiness is a good look on just about anyone, turns out.

There's no formal introduction to her sudden presence. She leans over and punches him in the shoulder instead. "Why are you sitting out here?"

"Why are you?"

"And I thought you didn't like rhetorical questions," she throws back. She drops into Ria's unoccupied chair and slings her feet up into his lap. He doesn't move them.

"It wasn't rhetorical."

He's got that insane, stupid urge to be blindly curious again. Tarquin and Ria he gets, but her, especially her fuelled by any amount of alcohol, is not someone he expected to come check on him. He's surprised she even noticed he was gone.

Emmi grins. "What, do you want me to admit that I love you? That I care about your well-being? The audacity. Does that make you happy?"

"Overjoyed," he says flatly. She leans over to hit him again, but with her clumsy aim and her shorter reach, this time he's able to lean away before she can do any damage. With Icarus on pace with her drinking he's probably telling her everything and anything about their personal life, judging by her previous statement.

He's less mad about it than he thought he would be.

She wiggles a hand out. "Can I see?"

"No."

She accepts that. "One day?"

"Maybe."

It's a likely no. Icarus is less driven to make fun of him these days, at least about anything they consider remotely serious, so she's the last one on the list of people he's giving this to when he's done. Emmi, however, will take every word he writes and make a noose out of them. Whenever he steps too far out of line she'll choke him and brings him back in.

He's never been glad to have someone to keep him in line.

Not until now, anyway.

"Do you, really?" she asks. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out what it is she's asking after.

"I wouldn't lie to him."

She nods, but looks pleased by the indirect answer regardless. She leans back into the chair, something faraway in her eyes for a long moment. Ideally he'd like to blame it on the alcohol, but it's not that. They don't talk about this. At this point it's unspoken.

He lets her stew for a few minutes, lets her get lost in herself. He writes as much as he can in that time, and more words come pouring out of him than he thought capable. He's just writing and not thinking.

Eventually she lifts her feet, and she grabs the edge of the chair to pull herself up, steady. He nudges a leg out to keep her from stumbling.

"You're going to miss it," she says.

"Miss what? The new year?"

"Yeah."

"I'll be sitting right here," he says, with an exaggerated point to the chair. "Won't miss anything."

It's just another second, minute, day. Another year. He doesn't care when or what it is - he's just grateful to be alive.

Emmi looks down, and nudges him one last time. "You want me to go get him?"

"You won't need to."

She considers that, nods in agreement, and then disappears. At least she can hold her alcohol; he can't say the same about someone else.

He reads over the slew of rather tragic words he got out in Emmi's presence, the whole lot of them. It's more than he ever expected to get out, and on top of that he'd like to think they're even slightly articulate. He really is trying, at least for something that resembles decency and an appropriate human response. It's hard for someone who often times doesn't know what that is, but he's learning.

He's learning a lot.

You asked if we were okay - we are. I think we are, at least. We're learning how to be. It's not bad out here, if that's what you were wondering. You wouldn't have sent us out here if you thought it was bad, so trust in that, at least. It's cold as hell, but we're used to it now. It was nice in the summer, so I don't think anybody minds.

If you don't have a heart attack and die at the sight of this letter (preferably don't) then you'll have to let me know how the whole Presidential campaign thing is going. We got a rough three and a half news channels out here and they're all local, so we don't know much, and I don't think Luca tells us everything. He probably doesn't trust us. Or me. Who knows.

Seriously, you don't need to worry about us. You have enough to worry about on your end, and you've got cameras following your every move. They'll start asking questions if you looked concerned too often. Just pretend it's the baby, or something. I'm sure they'll believe that. Let me know how the damn thing turns out, though, and don't let it turn out at all like me. You've got less than two years to influence it before it maybe meets me, so. Get on that.

On second thought, Soran crosses out all of the it parts and fits in a nice her/him instead. He doesn't want to get chastised through a letter, across the country.

He starts on the next paragraph, and the door creaks open. He doesn't move, letting himself read through it.

Not going to lie, and you'd somehow see through it even if I did, but I was worried about this place at first. Or maybe about how everyone was going to take it, but like I said, we're good. I'm getting more and more confident about that with every day.

Icarus drapes his arms over his shoulders from behind, propping his chin up. Soran jabs him with the pen cap without thinking.

"You having fun out here?"

"The most."

"Come back inside, then," Icarus presses. He can smell the alcohol on him, but considering he made it out here in one piece, apparently unassisted, he can't actually be that bad off. Isn't that the most newsworthy thing of the night so far.

"I will. I think I'm going to finish this first."

"Really?"

"Mhm."

Icarus says nothing to that, tipping his face to hide in the crook of Soran's shoulders. He's got him so thoroughly trapped in the chair he can barely move his arms, let alone move the pen to write anymore.

He sighs. "You're going to be the death of me."

"Probably," Icarus accepts with a mumble. "But you love me, so that's alright."

"I do," he agrees. "Though I'm beginning to regret that decision."

Icarus' face sours - he feels it, although he can't see it, and nudges him gently before he can take that too seriously and start crying on him or something equally dramatic. Soran's not in the mood to spend another emotional night on their bathroom floor or anyone else's for that matter, not now and preferably never again.

"Alright, I'll let you finish it," Icarus says, stepping away. "I'm coming back out here in five mintues to kiss you, though."

"Why?" he wonders.

"Because it's a thing," Icarus emphasizes, making a few vague gestures with his hands that don't explain anything at all. "See you in five minutes."

Soran doesn't even know why he's bothering to leave when he's going to go stand inside the door for five minutes, maybe, more likely closer to four and a half, before he comes back out to do it.

He's got a rough four and a half to finish this, though, before he's distracted by something else. Less, now.

He writes whatever he can get out. He'll cross things out later if he has to, rip the makeshift letter in two if it's that bad. Right now it's about whatever words come to mind, whichever ones feel the most honest. It's a policy he had never adhered to before, but now it feels natural. It feels like he's never told a lie in his life.

Icarus is back out in even less time than Soran predicted. Money lost, there. He scribbles out something that constitutes as last words, he hopes, before Icarus grabs him by the shirt and hauls him out of the chair to kiss him. Someone's shouting in the house, but it's exuberant and cheerful and even slightly annoying, but not really. He ignores it. He's gotten cold out here, and Icarus is stunningly warm, fueled by the packed bodies in the house and the alcohol swimming in his veins. The combination when they meet in the middle is something that feels too close to perfect for two people that aren't.

They aren't, but it feels like they could be. It doesn't matter how delusional the thought is.

When he's able to pull away long enough to glance at the clock through the back window, it's ticked over to midnight.

"We've got another year," Icarus says, lips brushing against his jaw.

Another year means more after that. It means a continued life, even if it never gets to perfect. It doesn't have to be.

Soran scoops up the notebook where he abandoned it on the chair. The pen is long gone; it's a good thing he wrangled an ending out of himself while he still could, because it's fled from his hands and his brain and may not be making a reappearance.

Icarus satiates his own curiosity and leaves his eyes where they are, half-closed in contentment, when Soran lifts the notebook beyond his shoulder to look it over. He reads it through more than once, somehow satisfied with what he finds each time. There's no use changing the words.

Not when they're true.

Yes, I was worried. But oddly enough - and I know you'll feel some sort of sick satisfaction at this - there's hope out here too.

That's weird, isn't it? It's weird. But hope is everywhere around this place. You can feel it, taste it, act like the water's made out of it, whatever you want.

The Nine are happy here. Prometheus is happy here. And their families - God, their families. Their kids and everyone they brought along with them. There's such a stupidly high amount of hope there someone like you could look at it and die happy, I imagine. I wouldn't blame you.

There's hope out here. It almost makes me feel like I could be happy too.

One day, anyway. Don't get too emotional on me now. I won't go any deeper into the future, so I'll just leave that part unwritten for now.

The thing I've accepted, finally, is that there's always going to be hope. It's not going anywhere. I think for a long time I tried to deny its existence. That's what was easier for someone like me. For all of us.

It's here, though. It's everywhere.

There's always going to be hope. Don't get that twisted. Remember that, when things are bad.

And there's always going to be us, too.

But don't tell anyone I said that, hey?

END.