Chapter 31
Cloud Chamber Rain
(Fei's theme song: 'People Are Strange' from the album 'Strange Days' by 'The Doors')
In the dusty cellar lab down in the heart of Atomic Physics, the two young men, one Eurasian, the other south eastern Asian, were still lounging side by side, elbows on the rim of the strange, cloudy device, staring into it, thoughts sparking through their minds like the subatomic particles through the saturated mists of the Cloud Chamber.
Going back into Akihito's for breakfast had to have been the most courageous thing he had ever done in his life.
All his instincts had urged him to flee, to make his way to the private airfield and jet back to Hong Kong. Danger? Ha. He was a trained assassin. Even Taramasov here - he might not be able to shake him off like at Akihito's, there he had used the element of surprise - but he wouldn't let him near enough! And then that Russian brawn stood no chance against him. He lived a precarious life, death was part of it, he didn't mind.
Tao. The thought of leaving Tao alone in this world hurt, hurt badly … but it might not be helped. He had known this all along and set everything up for him. Tao was twelve, was accepted to Eton for the summer term, he would make it … with a little help from Yoh perhaps …
Yoh! As hazy as some parts of yesterday evening remained, one thing was relentlessly resurfacing, clear and terrible - that push … Yoh had pushed him when he felt the stinging pain in his thigh … Yoh! not Yoh too … and was he going mad, or had he really, before losing consciousness, Misha's arms already around him, seen Yoh, not really fighting, exchanging a look with Asami … ?
Asami.
Fei squeezed his eyes shut for a moment and exhaled audibly, causing Alexej beside him to stir.
Asami had been there, yes, or was that part a dream after all, after seven years …
… his - mentor? first love? … the familiar rush of despair called forth by the smallest thing reminding of him …
… looking up at someone from out of a car … a handsome, male Japanese face… a bar of the kind where they had met, formal, very different from the student's pub … the modern decor of a luxurious hotel room …
He had never re-entered his father's guesthouse where Asami had kissed him, where they had sex, perfect sex, he thought bitterly … but he hadn't sold it either.
For some time he even thought he could never return to Hong Kong. The most random things, like being given a glass of orange juice … or being informed his coat was at the cleaner's … rain … could bring on a wave of desolation, a sense of falling out of the world not even the most brutal Kung Fu training could ease ...
... he shivered.
... now, something was different ... for the first time, thinking of that time with a person he had never really questioned … he felt mostly plain angry. Jerk! What a naïve little fool he had been, running right into it … and just a little bit forlorn … it had somehow given him a hold, the searing pain that name always brought up in him, even when making him … do that …. hurt himself … and it was suddenly as if behind a glass barrier, one step removed.
This morning, it was not because of fear he had stayed. He had stayed …
… because he wanted to.
Because, through the void of his world, there was now piercing this cruel, white hot pin point of hope.
In some deep down, hidden, bluebeard's chamber, dusty, approached only once before, a little door had opened, just a chink, but the flood was released, there was no turning back, no return to his old self.
Giving in to Akihito, who in some way had to do with the day he changed … going back to his classmates, who were acting so puzzling towards him … going back to face Misha … there was nothing in the world he wanted so much.
And nothing he was so afraid of.
- to be continued -
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