A/N: And so we have another update! This one was actually relatively easy to write because I had planned it out way beforehand. I wanna thank you guys again for being patient with me and my slow ass updating schedule. Seriously...

But anyway! After this, I'm not sure when I'll be able to update again, but be on the look out!

Many much love~

~shine

~Damaged~

Elesis sighed heavily as she held her head in her hands. Hot tears spilled down her cheeks as she recalled the last two hours she had spent with Elsword. She had finally told him. Their father's dirty little secret, and he reacted as strongly as she had expected. He was angry, and that was to be expected. He was hurt. He lashed out so strongly that he stormed off after smashing one of Ara's favorite dishes and cursing her to the very ground.

She felt worse than dirt. And honestly, she deserved it.

At least, that's what Elesis kept telling herself in order to rationalize her brother's anger. To be fair, anyone would be hurt to learn that their father's supposed M.I.A status all a complete sham. Their father had gone AWOL, and started another family deep in some forest, but eventually died of his wounds. And Elesis had brought the very product of their father's shame with her, but hid her from Elsword, knowing what he would do.

The girl, nameless at first when Elesis found her, stared at her worriedly. She was quiet, wearing a sad look on her face that Elesis didn't know how to erase. No matter what she did, even Elesis knew that there was still some hidden resentment deep within herself as well. This child...was her sister. Living proof that their father had been a coward and left his 18 year old daughter to fight in a war that was much too big for her all on her own.

In another alternate reality, Elesis knew that the carnage would have broken her, mind, body and soul. But she had been lucky. Penensio had there to pick up her broken body and what remained of the scattered pieces of her pride and put her back together again, when she really needed her father. When she needed a friend.

Elesis opened her mouth to speak, but choked back her words and sighed, trying to steady her voice as well as her nerves. "Laby...go play, okay?" Elesis spoke, her voice shaking. Quiet as a mouse, the rosy haired girl nodded, picking up her mirror quietly, and vanished from the living room.

Ara was silent beside her girlfriend the entire time Elesis had cried, stroking her back to ease the woman. It was one of the rare moments she had ever seen such a strong, fearless woman give in to her emotions. Elesis had always appeared to be a strong, charismatic person who naturally drew people to her. But in the end, even Elesis had her limits. Out of the three years she had known and dated Elesis, this was only the third time that image of Elesis had been shattered like thin glass.

"My love...do not blame yourself for this. Even you could not have predicted this outcome." Ara said softly, stroking Elesis's hair, running her fingers through the mess of crimson. "You will come from this stronger. And in time, he will understand. He may not fully accept Laby, and frankly, I know neither will you. But that is why you have each other.."

Elesis sighed "We've never been all that close." Elesis said with a frown. "To be honest, I feel like I failed him. As a sister, as a role model...as a person."

"Elesis…" Ara was silent for a moment. There wasn't anything she could say to that. At least, nothing that Elesis wouldn't immediately counter with many different reasons why she was such a failure. It was normally during times like this when Ara would simply not deal with Elesis, because she knew how stubborn the red head could be when she was so set on thinking something ill about herself.

But this time, she wouldn't have it.

Growing frustrated with her girlfriend, Ara pulled roughly on Elesis's cheeks with a cute pout. "Knock it off!" She growled, earning a yelp from Elesis and a surprised stare in response. "You're better than this! The woman I fell in love with would never let something like this bring her down! She was strong, fierce as a raging inferno, and more passionate and loving than any other person I could name! She fought hard for what she wanted, she loved deeply, and when something was wrong, she fixed it! No questions asked!" Ara ranted.

"But how the hell am I supposed to fix this?! Our dad went and had another kid! He left me for dead and abandoned his son!" Elesis shouted back. She sighed heavily, defeated. "I could only do so much...you know?"

"And you did the best you could. No one can fault you for that. But you were young, my love. Mistakes were bound to be made." Ara says as she strokes the redhead's hair. Elesis clung to her tightly, tears welling up in her eyes again. "But your brother still loves you. He cares about you so much, but he was going through his own pain as well. You were doing what you thought was best. You did what any parent tries to do for their children. You wanted him to be able to build a life he'd be proud of."

"...I know. I just feel like such a colossal failure." Elesis sighed heavily.

"You're not." Elsword said, gently closing the door behind him with a soft smile. When Elesis didn't look at him, he sighed and scratched his head. "...look. I know I was a pretty impossible kid back then. I gave you trouble, stressed you out, all the usual angsty teenager crap. But I didn't think you were a failure, sis...I just needed you to listen to me."

"But- I tried…! I did everything!" Elesis said, clinging tightly to Ara. "I took us to counseling, tried to take you places so you would open up a little bit...everything!"

"But I didn't need a parent, sis. I just needed you." Elsword replied with a soft sigh. "I wanted the goofy older sister who would sneak out of her room at night and risk getting yelled at by dad to see if I was all right. The sister who would stand up for me when I was in trouble and bail me out." Elsword sat beside Elesis and placed a hand on her head, smiling gently when Elesis instinctively leaned into his touch. "You weren't a failure. I was just being too hard on you, that's all. I'm sorry."

Elesis was quiet for a long while. She didn't really know what to say. Getting an apology from Elsword was rare, but the fact that he even came to her about anything at all was a step in the right direction. Maybe there was hope for them after all. She smiled softly, though she continued to cling to Ara.

"I'm sorry too." Elesis replied. "I promise I'll do better. For the both of us."

"There you go trying to be a tryhard. Just be yourself. You don't have to be the perfect sister, or the perfect mother hen or whatever." Elsword poked his sister's cheeks with a goofy grin. "Just be my sister. I wanna see what kind of person you became. We aren't high schoolers anymore either, so I'm not gonna duel you again."

"Yeah, I'm kinda tired of kicking our ass." Elesis laughed. "But...okay. Then...I want you to meet someone. You'll be pretty ticked at dad, but then again, almost everyone is. Come on out, sweetie!" Elesis called out, looking over her shoulder towards the kitchen. It took a few minutes, but when the child poked her head around the corner again, Elsword bit his tongue and waited patiently. She cautiously approached the siblings. She hoped they weren't going to yell again.

"Elsword, this is Laby...our sister."

- x - x - x -

When the next day came, Add was awake bright an early. He made coffee, fixed his hair, made sure his clothed were ironed and pressed as professionally as possible, despite now being jobless and broke, and he was glad he had decided to keep a bottle of his favorite cologne in his jacket pocket. He looked good, all things considered.

He went downstairs for breakfast. Aisha was cooking again, though she made it a point to dress in baggier clothing since he was around now, he mused. That was fine. His mind was like a steel trap. He remembered every contour of her body as if her were in high school again. She had certainly filled out a bit more since then, though he couldn't say it was by much. Not that he minded. He preferred his women thin anyhow.

He sat at the table with his coffee and waited for breakfast to be served. He had gotten used to the tension between himself and Aisha by now. He supposed it couldn't be helped. But unless she was willing to bridge the gap between them, he would be patient and wait.

As usual, Eve didn't come from her room for breakfast. She sent Oberon to collect it for her, and the silent butler kept a close eye on the well dressed man the entire time. Add amusedly smiled and waved at Oberon, smirking when the butler shuddered and walked away quickly.

"You're dressed up awfully nice for someone who lost everything." Aisha replied, setting the plate of food in front of Add. He thanked her quietly with a nod and a small smile before glancing at her once again. She wore baggy sweatpants and a hoodie today. Almost as if she were going to work out. "You have a date or something?" Aisha teased lightly.

"You...could say that." Add replied with a mysterious tone. "Just having lunch with someone. May I use your phone later? I need to make a call and pull some strings."

"You could just ask Eve, but okay, I guess." Aisha shrugged. She took her plate over towards ehr work area and sat in the window. It was her favorite spot, Add found out as he had observed her. She would sometimes paint the landscape when she was fresh out of ideas. "Oh, Add. I need you to do me a favor too. I need you to pose for me. I had some ideas for this compilation I'm putting together, and I need you for a series of reference poses."

Add quirked an eyebrow at that, but nodded. "Very well. Just let me know when." Add answered back softly. Silence returned between the two of them and Add sighed heavily. "Aisha, may I ask you something?"

"Hm?" The painter looked up from her breakfast, blinking slowly.

"Do you still...hate me?" Add asked. For the first time in his life, he was hesitant to know the answer. There were days when it felt almost as though they were back in high school. He would tease her a bit, and she would pout so cutely, roll her eyes and throw amusing little quips back. But mostly, things were like this. Stagnant. As if any and all progress he had made to reclaim at least a tiny part of their friendship had been for naught.

Aisha was silent for a moment, before sighing herself. "Not….really? I guess I might have acted like it out of some kind of self preservation instinct, but I'm mostly over what happened. It's just...I really loved you back then, you know? I wanted to be with you, and I was trying my hardest to stay together. I knew you were difficult, but I also knew that you wouldn't do anything to hurt me. At least, I thought I knew that." Aisha said, after biting her lip for a moment. Add remembered that habit. Whenever she was studying or searching for the right words to say, she would sometimes do that. "But then you did. I cried for a long time after that, and yet you never came to comfort me. I guess that's what hurts the most. It's not something I can just easily forgive, no matter how many years have passed."

Add was silent, nodding slowly as he ran a hand through his hair. "For what it's worth, I really am sorry about all of that." Add said. He didn't know what else to say. What could he say? He messed up. Because of him, one of the greatest women in his life had been hurt terribly, and now, as a result, he wasn't even sure if he could win her back. But he would be damned if he let that punk have her! "I can't make any excuse to justify what I said and did, and neither would I want to. I fucked up, plain and simply."

"Yeah. You did." Aisha returned flatly. Add winced somewhat at her tone, but seeing the slight crooked smile on Aisha's lips gave him hope. "But I can't keep shoving it in your face either."

"Is there any hope for me at all?" Add asked. "Can I not reclaim at least one small part of what we had?"

"I want to say no, but, that remains to be seen, I guess." Aisha answered with a shrug. She finished eating and grew silent. With that tiny spark of hope in his heart, Add finished eating as well before pulling on his gloves. He made the calls he needed while Aisha asked him to pose for her her. It took some time, but with the references she needed, Aisha quickly dismissed Add so she could think. Add merely laughed and left Aisha to do her thing.

From around the corner, Eve stood with her back pressed against the wall, listening to the two speak. Add was late for their early morning planning session, and now she knew why. She sighed softly. She would have felt upset or even jealous, if she cared enough about Add. Honestly, this was just the sort of thing she had expected. Blinking slowly, she returned to her room. It looked as though she would be working alone today.

- x - x - x -

Elsword spent as much time as he could with Elesis and getting to know their little sister a bit more. It was weird. After all this time, he still couldn't get used to the idea that he was an older sibling, try as he might. And Laby was a sweet girl. Evergetic and kind, but also worried about making them angry. It made him wonder what kind of life she had at home with their dad.

"Hey Laby?" Elsword asked finally as they sat at the table playing cards. Elsword taught her how to play Go Fish, and she seemed to really like it. The tiny girl looked up from ehr cards, her cute concentrated face evaporated into a look of puzzlement. "What was dad like when you guys were living together?"

Laby was quiet for a few moments. "Papa was...kind of mean to Laby." She said at last. "He would yell at Laby when she was bad, and he never wanted to play. But he would talk about you and sissy a lot? He said you were good kids."

Elsword bit his tongue for probably the 60th time that day. "Well, then it's good that you'll be staying with us for a little while." Elsword said, smiling kindly and ruffling the little girl's already messy hair. "Because dad was mean to us too. And we would never yell at you like him." When Laby smiled brightly at him, Elsword smiled back. "And I'm sorry for yelling at you earlier. It's just that...we thought dad was dead all this time, and then you show up, and everything we thought was a lie. It really hurt."

"What he's trying to say is that it's not your fault. Dad's the one to blame." Elesis said, patting Laby on the head as well. "So don't be sad, okay?"

Laby nodded, tears welling up in her eyes as she rushed into Elesis's arms. She stayed like that for a while, and Elsword couldn't help but sigh heavily and smile sadly. He checked his phone and cursed softly. "Sorry to leave in the middle of a game, but I gotta go, guys. I got a lunch date to get to."

Elesis smirked knowingly at Elsword and he rolled his eyes. "Okay~ tell that Aisha girl hat she has my blessing!" Elesis teased as Elsword rushed out the door. It was quiet for a long while. Laby refused to let Elesis go, and so the redhead ended up having to carry the girl around like a monkey. Elesis laughed softly and shook her head. "Well, at least I'll get to learn what parenthood is like…"

- x - x - x -

Add tapped his foot lightly as he waited, checking his watch for the upmteenth time in five minutes. The boy was late. Granted it was only a few minutes, but he was a timely fellow. He hated being late without reason. He had almost given up on waiting and collected his bill, when he saw Elsword rushing past his window and into the cafe.

"You're late." Add spoke with a slight grumble.

"Yeah, sorry. I had something personal to deal with, and my sister lives farther from here than I thought." Elsword chuckled as he sat across from Add. When the waitress came by to give him a menu, he shook his head. "Just coffee, please. And a slice of apple pie." He winked at the girl with a grin, and she blushed, rushing to complete the order. He turned his attention back to Add afterwards. "So...what did you want to talk about?"

"Nothing in particular. I just wanted to get to know you a little better, since it seems that you are a source of comfort for our...mutual friend." Add said. He sipped his tea and watched Elsword's expression change from one of confusion to skepticism. "How much do you know about Aisha and I, if I may ask?"

"Nothing, really. Just that she seems to get uncomfortable when you're around, so I'm assuming you guys have some kind of history." Elsword shrugged. His coffee and pie arrived, and he thanked the waitress with a smile. She was cute, he had to admit. The glasses really suited her, and her shoulder length hair was styled rather cutely. When the waitress blushed further and thanked him before running off, Elsword laughed softly.

"My, you certainly seem to be a hit with the ladies." Add joked lightly. Elsword laughed.

"Nah, not really. At least, I'm not really serious about it." Elsword shrugged. "Just something I've picked up living on my own. Sometimes a girl likes to be appreciated, y'know?"

"Is that what you're doing with Aisha, then? Showing her appreciation?" Add asked evenly. His tone was calm, but he was trying his best to understand the boy and his motives. "You know, sending mixed signals is a bad thing as well. It causes more trouble that simply staying silent."

"Aisha? I mean...yes and no?" Elsword rubbed his chin in thought. "I mean...she's an amazing artist. And she has a talent for putting her thoughts into what she's painting, but I think the problem isn't the lack of people admiring her work. It's just that she...i dunno...doesn't show herself in her work. So...putting her in a happier mood, or sparking her curiosity seems to help."

"And what do you know of the arts, if I may ask?" Add wondered.

"I play a bit of guitar to make extra travel expenses, or to make money for a hotel room for the night. But I can't draw to save my life." Elsword laughed. "But I think whether it's art or...whatever it is that you do, or anything that involves you personally, as long as you put your best effort into something and show the person you are deep down...that's the most inspiring and beautiful work a person can make."

"Beautifully worded. Now we answer the 'no' in your answer. Are you saying you have no feelings for her at all? Are you merely doing this for her? Or is there some ulterior motive?" Add asked. "Bear in mind that Aisha is someone from my past. Someone that I care deeply about."

"Well, I'm not really looking to date her, if that's what you mean. I can't deny that I do like her somewhat, but we both have things to resolve before anything happens between us." Elsword chuckled softly. "Such as my own special person from my past."

"Please, tell me more." Add leaned on the table now, suddenly interested in what the boy had to say on this subject.

"It's...complicated. I don't want to talk about it." Elsword deflated, running his hands through his hair. Add grimaced. The boy was slippery. Well, no matter. He thought about his next round of questions, but Elsword, it seemed, had beat him to the punch this time. "So, what's the history with you and Aisha?"

"We are childhood friends, and we dated back in high school. Some...unfortunate circumstances happened and we broke up." Add answered vaguely with a shrug. Elsword nodded, but said nothing on the subject. "I have one more question. Let's say Aisha had admitted to you that she had feelings for you. Or rather, she was starting to fall for you. Knowing that someone one else, say...me, for example...were in love with her as well. Could you in good conscience begin a relationship with her?"

Elsword shrugged. "That depends on my feelings about her as well. But right now? I don't think so. There's too much on my plate, with my sisters, my on and off again boyfriend, finding a place to stay and dealing with some other shit. That's too much to bring to the table." Elsword laughed softly. "But...if somewhere down the line I finally get all this shit sorted out, then I'll think about it."

"I see. I have one last question." Add stated as he reached into his pocket for his phone. "He pulled up the image of Elsword. It was a wanted poster, and the reward was for quite a hefty sum. "What could you possibly have done to get a 50,000 ED bounty on your head?"

Elsword's face paled, and he growled. But before he could move, he was already restrained in a headlock, and several police officers were already jumping up to cuff him. Growling angrily, Elsword struggled, but it was no use. Add grinned maliciously and winked at elsword. "No hard feelings...am I right?"

"You bastard!" Elsword cursed as he was dragged away. Add waited until he was paid the amount he was owed, humming to himself as he walked home, swinging the pocket watch on its chain merrily.

Talk about a lucky break!