A/N: Prompt from magisterkekko. Thank you~

There is swearing in this, and some somewhat darker themes? Also, it's been forever since I've updated, I apologize. Um. Happy 2016?

26

Mirrors

IV has this reoccurring dream where he's surrounded by mirrors.

When it starts, all of the mirrors are blank - white - and when he goes to stand in front of one of them, he doesn't see his reflection. Good, IV thinks. Good. He doesn't want to see his face anyway. It's mangled with a scar now. It's ugly now.

And for a long time, he wanders around a dark, never-ending room, filled with mirror after mirror after mirror. This is why, he figures, he will wake up with sore legs. Because he walks for the entire night, step after step after step, mile after mile after mile. It's a big room. Maybe it's not even a room.

IV stops in front of a particularly large mirror. It's as big as the wall in Ryouga's old kitchen in the mansion. He looks both ways, up and down what should be a hall, but it's too dark to say for sure. It's stark and empty.

IV closes his eyes for a moment. When he opens them, he knows that the mirror will transform.

And it does. He opens his eyes, slowly and in a way that is so dreamily detached that it may not have happened at all. He is looking at his reflection, finally, like every night. He watches himself contort and break and squirm, like contemporary dance, catch on fire, scream. And then the mirror shatters, and it's so loud that there is no noise when the rest of the mirrors in the dark, never-ending room splinter into millions of pieces in suit. The glass falls around him, and when he looks down, he can see her.

The shards arrange themselves crookedly and the reflection of a girl on fire stares up at him. She doesn't move as the flames lick all around her, touching her face, her eyes, and she doesn't say a thing to him when he slams his foot over her face to hide it. He can't look anymore. He can't. He twists his foot, the glass cuts it, there's blood on the glass as he keeps twisting because he wants it to go away go away go away-

The entire room shatters this time - and he's falling, falling for what feels like years, gazing into the burning girl's eyes, each on separate fragments. She blinks, she's crying now, and he jerks awake, sweating and shaking and sighing because it's the middle of the night and he has things to do in the morning.

.

.

IV tells Rio about the dream when he's nineteen years old (almost twenty, he thinks with surprise). He has had that nightmare since the day he nearly killed her, and he has decided that she deserves to know.

Rio looks at him sadly. "That was so long ago. I've forgiven you."

He shrugs. "That isn't enough to stop them apparently."

She doesn't say anything for a while. She moves a little closer to touch her shoulder to his arm. He looks down and is struck by how much taller he is than her now. God, she is so small, so tiny, and it's so ironic because he knows that she could flip him onto the floor before he could blink. So much power contained in such a little body. It's one of the things he loves about her.

"You know that you can always call me, right?" she asks. "If it ever happens again."

"I know."

.

.

And it does. He's falling and flailing and flying. He hits his mattress and wakes up hyperventilating.

Some nights are worse than others. It's been so long that there are a few nights where he doesn't dream at all. There are nights where the dream is distant and fuzzy. There are nights where it feels real.

Tonight, he wakes up in a room that feels dark and unfamiliar, and he almost falls out of bed because the only thing he can think clearly at the moment is to find the phone find the phone find the phone - there - and this time, he does slip off of the bed and onto the floor. He's clutching his phone, though, and that's what matters. He can't remember how to dial. Where are his contacts? Where?

It takes a few minutes, but eventually, there's a ringing in his ear and he is sitting against the bed and nightstand, pressed in the corner that they make. He's slowly starting to get his bearings, but that doesn't stop the shaking. His trembling fingers nearly drop the phone a couple of times. God, if he drops it, he may scream.

She doesn't answer. He's shaking all over again.

It is two in the fucking morning, of course she isn't answering. But he still feels betrayed and scared because he can still see her body shattered in the air, misshapen and scattered. He can still see her crying eyes and the two halves of her mouth pried open in a wordless shout. He can feel where the glass dug into his foot. It stings. It burns. She's burning. He's going to throw up.

The sound of his phone ringing makes him jump and it takes a few tries to answer it because his vision is fuzzy. Whether he is crying or going blind or insane, he doesn't know. All he knows is that Rio is talking to him on the other line.

"Hey, I'm sorry, I couldn't get to my phone in time. Are you okay?"

The question is so ridiculously simple that IV finds himself laughing. It's a breathless, desperate sort of laugh that he hasn't heard come from his own lungs since he was seventeen. It terrifies him and he can't stop.

"IV," Rio says calmly, sternly. "Breathe. Breathe with me, okay? Here. In...out...in...out..."

It takes a while, but his laughter becomes gasping, and his gasping becomes shallow gulps, and that becomes quick but controlled breaths of sweet, sweet air. "In...out..." His lightheaded-ness fades and the aching in his chest lessens.

"IV?"

In...out...

"I'm here," he croaks. His voice doesn't sound right. "I'm here."

In...out...

.

.

When he was thirteen, IV broke his first mirror. He can remember how the glass sliced into his skin, like it was made of nothing, like he was made of nothing. It hadn't stung at first.

But hell, does it ache afterward. For a long time.

And he thinks that that is how it always works. When his father betrayed them, when his brother left, Ryoga, Rio, dying in the war, the scar on his face - none of those had hurt initially. The afterache, however, lasts forever.

.

.

He is twenty years old now. He is a grown fucking man.

But age does not stop the panic attack. Age does not stop the nightmares. Age does not stop him from feeling helpless, alone, and afraid.

He calls Rio, but it rings twice before he hangs up. She tries calling him back, but he rejects it. He buries his phone under his pillow and makes his way to the bathroom. Throws up. Flushes. Pulls aside the shower curtain and sits in the tub, drawing his knees to his chest and resting his head against the tiled wall. It's pounding.

The coolness of the tub and the hardness of the wall gives him a sense of reality. He can breathe again, a little. Still ragged. He doesn't know how long he stays there, but it's a long time.

When Rio sits on the edge of the tub, it scares the life out of him. He hadn't heard the door open, or her footsteps in the hall, or seen her come into the bathroom. She used the spare key he gave her. So here she is, in a sweater and pajama pants, her hair all over the place from sleep. He wants to ask why she's here, but he can't seem to find the words. He stares instead.

God, he must look terrible. He's sweating and he's cold and he's shivering and he's hugging himself as if he was the only touchable thing on the planet. It suddenly feels harder to breathe once more - he's humiliated and -

Rio runs her fingers through his hair and says softly, "When you're ready, let's go back to bed, okay?"

And it takes a while. Getting out of the tub is a journey in itself, and making it back to the bedroom would have been impossible if he'd been by himself. IV pauses in the doorway, looking wide-eyed at his room and gulping involuntarily. Rio tugs on his arm and leads him to his bed, sits him down, and goes back to turn off any lights she had flicked on.

She lies down beside him, pulling him down with her. He lies flat on his back, rigid, arms folded across his stomach. This is so much worse. If he wakes up confused, he could hurt her. She's right there. Right there to break.

Rio places an arm over his chest, gripping his shoulder and snuggling up close to him. "Go to sleep. I've got you."

It's like magic. He can't keep his eyes open. This time, though, he doesn't fall (fall, falling, fallen, fell) asleep - he drifts.

.

.

It's the best night's sleep IV has had in years.

~Finish~