The deafening blast shuddered the apartment and two sickening, very concerning thuds hit against the back wall of the main area. Anya's ears rang, dust billowed in through the open bedroom door, and she couldn't tell if that was what was choking her or her heart that shook in her chest like a maraca. The fighting seemed to have ended and her hands slowly left her ears as she stared after the door, waiting for her parents to appear. Or cough. Or say something. To do something. But all that sounded was settling debris, something crackling, something shrill materializing in the distance, thudding footsteps and slamming doors in the halls, and screams echoing beneath and above her that made her head hurt.

BRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIING!

Anya jolted and gasped at the voices suddenly adding to the flood in her head. It hurt. It hurt so much. Scared, urgent emotions and voices throbbed and she whimpered at it. It wouldn't go away. She clutched her head at the invasive noises, making her lightheaded and dizzy. She wouldn't let the hands that meant to reach under her arms, pick her up. Would they take her away from here? She couldn't leave without her parents.

When the voices had somewhat quieted a minute later and the head-splitting migraine softened to a more minor headache—the voices moving a good distance outside the building—she finally looked up to the was drifting in, the smell thick in her nose, though it hardly registered as a concern and she got up off her knees, hardly realizing what she was doing.

A voice rang like a distant memory in her ears, faint and pointless in the present moment, and she absentmindedly brushed the touch off her shoulder like it was a mere bug. Maybe it was. She didn't pay much mind to it. She gripped her shirt at her stomach and braced a hand on the wall as her feet sludged to the door, clamping a trembling hand on the doorframe when she reached it.

The room was clouded in grey. It was thickest here, though Anya could see the still forms of her parents on the floor, silhouetted in the smog and wreathed by the splintered furniture around them. She gasped a breath in, not understanding the tears on her face or the wobble in her breath. Her parents were sleeping, only sleeping, her parents wouldn't get hurt by something like this, they were only sleeping.

She couldn't feel their m—

Sleeping, sleeping, sleeping, sleeping, she should go wake them up.

One step in front of the other, she reluctantly removed the hand that kept her steady on the doorframe, though she didn't understand that either—her parents were sleeping, they were fine, Anya shouldn't be unsteady—and moved hesitantly across the floor, focused on them and only them. Her eyes stung with contaminants and watered her vision, making it harder and harder to see.

"M. . ." She whispered, words hiding in her throat, and she shuddered and fell to her knees next to her mama. She lay on her side with her back to Anya, and a small hand lifted to rest on her shoulder. When Anya tried to speak, only a small whimper of a sound vibrated against her neck. Anya gave her mama a light nudge. "Ma—" She managed to force out a wisp of a plea, but it was hoarse and too quiet to wake her mama. Anya shook her a little harder.

Her mama didn't move.

Anya's tongue had forgotten how to form sounds and she couldn't think beyond the sight of her parents lying on the floor. Unmoving. Asleep. Still and quiet where they had been fighting just a moment before. Anya's chest inexplicably ached and until she sucked in a deep breath, she hadn't realized she'd been holding it. Her mind was clouded with a fog she couldn't dispel, though she wasn't entirely sure she wanted it gone. It hugged her consciousness with a muffling, heavy blanket, softening the edges and forcing her to focus only on what was right in front her. Protecting her like a pair of tinted glasses from the harshness of the sun. Nothing else existed. Just what was important right here in front of her. Anya's heart beat slow and painfully against her chest, throbbing in her ears and pulsing in her fingertips. For the strength in her heart, her blood dragged, and with it, her body. She nudged her mama with her traitorously weighted, shaky limb and refused to acknowledge the dread threading in her veins with each touch her mama didn't respond to. Every moment that she stayed still. Every second that Anya couldn't hear her mi—

Sleeping, sleeping, sleeping, sleeping.

Her parents were sleeping. A deep sleep. A deep, deep sleep. Anya hadn't ever come across this weird, dampened feeling before and it sc—

Sleeping, sleeping, sleeping, sleeping.

They were tired from fighting those bad guys. Really, really tired.

Her gaze lifted to the body a little further away where a form crouched next to her papa. But they were unimportant right now. Once more she attempted to find her voice and call to her papa, and once more it failed her.

Something terrible bubbled in her chest, her lungs, her entire being. She was sure she was breathing, but it didn't feel like it. The floor vibrated beneath her when bright colours flooded the edges of her vision and she hardly noticed the new minds that appeared. And then she was being lifted.

Her fingers being dragged out of reach of her mama was a strange feeling as her view widened with her rising altitude. This wasn't right. She had to stay with her mama. Her blood screeched at her. Her body screamed and cried in protest. A burn built inside her, the oxygen somehow all crammed in her lungs and unable to use it. She could only gasp in, a scream stifled by who-knew-what. The sound denied actualization swelled at the back of her throat and laid heavy in her skull. The pulse of her heart echoed hollowly as a drum in a cavernous room and she couldn't think. Her parents grew smaller and smaller as she was carried away and all she could do was watch.

—

It hadn't lasted long, had it? The promise of safety the Forgers had promised. The shield over his head holding the darkness at bay. The hope he had finally let himself consider, however cautiously and tentatively. There had been a possibility that everything might change, that things could be okay, that he could have a relationship with his little brother without having to worry what it might do to Damian or himself.

He had been safe and warm and the feeling was eradicated just like that.

Demetrius fought for calm. He fought to compartmentalize everything he didn't want to think about. He had to keep it together until they could escape the firemen escorting them out and the police that would greet them outside the building.

Telling himself that didn't do much though. He breathed shaky and slow, warding off the panic attack threatening to possess him the moment he let himself dwell on what was happening. His heart hammered too quickly to simply wrestle into control. Anya was being surprisingly still in his arm which helped. It would be harder to focus on not focusing if he had to focus on calming her own breakdown and keeping her from wriggling out of his grasp.

What did he do now? He had no plan. Nowhere to go. The attackers had found them so easily, so quickly, and—

Deep breath.

Another.

He had to keep it tog—

Deep breath.

Another.

A pained thought pricked Demetrius mind and he had to consciously loosen his grip on Damian's hand.

The fireman led them through a door and feet clapped echoes through the tall room as they descended the flights of stairs. Demetrius focused on each step carefully, watching his shoes land on the next step and the next. He held Damian's hand tight, afraid to let go. It was halfway down the last flight when he felt it and stopped. Anya felt it too.

Demetrius' breath hitched, gaze glued to his feet.

He had never hated so much to be right.

"Are you alright? We have to keep going, we're almost there." The fireman encouraged.

Yeah. That's what Demetrius was worried about.

The fireman got the children moving again and the object of Demetrius' fear stared back at him, freezing him to the spot outside the apartment's front entrance.

"Demetrius." His father said and the son's insides curled inwards to protect themselves. "I'm glad you're alright."

The prick pinged again in Demetrius' head, but the tight grip on Damian's hand was nothing compared to his little brother's own apprehension and held Demetrius' hand back, just as tight.

As much as Demetrius wanted to look away, he couldn't. The sirens no longer ran, but the colours spun just the same, washing his father in it's light every couple seconds. Even as Demetrius was pulled away from the building, he couldn't look away as they were instructed to sit on the ambulance to get looked over.

They should escape now. Run while they had a chance before it was too late. Slip into the night and melt into obscurity, flee the country, but Demetrius just couldn't move. He was pinned under his father's eyes. Cold, soulless eyes that had always unsettled him and promised retribution in only the way his father could convey without actually speaking.

Anya could probably hear how hard Demetrius' heart beat and the tension constricting his chest. He wondered if she even registered it. Damian was similarly frozen—everything he had been told about Donovan petrifying him into unknown fear with the knowledge that the Desmond boys were no longer safe from their father.

They should escape now.

There were too many people around. If they ran, would they be chased? Probably. How many of these people worked for his father? How many had given up their ethics to let him manipulate them? The paramedics were attending to the kids, they wouldn't be able to slip by unnoticed.

They had to—

They had to—

Deep breath. Breathe. Breathe. He pleaded with himself, remembering the hand on his shoulder and the warmth at his sides just yesterday.

The Forgers couldn't protect them anymore.

At last, his father broke contact and Demetrius did let himself breathe, shoving oxygen into his lungs as if he might store it there for when he couldn't breathe again. It would happen, he knew it. The relief on his chest was short-lived however, when the Forgers were brought out on stretchers. The object of his father's changed attention.

They were breathing. Demetrius had checked for vital signs before the firemen had ushered the kids out of the building, but the sight was a pain on his chest. A hitching tension he couldn't remember feeling before. They were still and. . .helpless and. . .

. . .and quiet.

They shouldn't be hurt like this. Demetrius should have returned home, or at the very least, taken Damian and ran, no matter how futile it would be or how much he'd wanted to have someone to rely on for once. What would happen to the Forgers now? What would happen to Damian and Anya? To Demetrius? Would his father leave Damian alone now that he had Demetrius? He wouldn't try to use both of them, would he?!

No. No. If Donovan even attempted to use Damian, he would lose his advantage over Demetrius and the eldest son knew that using him instead of Damian worked out for their father much better than anything else. He wouldn't risk Demetrius' cooperation and his years of experience for the slim possibility that Damian might become an esper or the fact that doing so, would set his plans plans back by years.

This had to be true. Demetrius didn't know what he'd do if it wasn't.

It was a small comfort.

When the paramedics declared the children were fine and the police didn't bother coming to speak with them, Demetrius knew it was his father's work. What had he told them? What lies and stories had he roped Demetrius into? How were the police alright with Anya being escorted with the Desmond family to their car?

The car. A pristine thing that gleamed dauntingly even amidst the lingering shadows of smoke and traces of filth and pieces of rubble decorating the ground. The grenade wasn't too destructive, but it had taken out most of the apartment room's street-facing wall and the dusty remnants still slightly choked the air.

The car. When had they started walking over? When had one of his father's drivers guided the children to it's open doors and waited for them to get in? Demetrius paused suddenly, a surge of gripping fear catching him as he processed what he was looking at. The implications of stepping inside where the doors would be locked and then driving too fast to get out. Delivering them to that house.

Escape.

They had to escape.

A pounding thudded in his chest, the only sign his body still pumped blood. It was hard to tell when every bit of him felt like a popsicle. He should run. Where? How many agents were scattered throughout the streets just waiting for him to do that and catch them? He could feel them. The presence of their minds leaking from the telepathic inhibitors no matter how much they thought the devices hid them from his awareness.

They were stuck. They had lost.

No.

No, no, no. Demetrius couldn't do this again, he couldn't, he couldn't, he cou—

Breathe.

He wouldn't be there forever. He'd make a plan, he'd—he'd—he'll do something. He couldn't—he couldn't stay there. There must be something he can do. The Forgers couldn't protect them anymore and now Demetrius had to protect Anya as well as Damian.

He wanted to break down crying when he didn't know how to do that. Not against him.

The driver waited for them to enter. Donovan didn't verbally chastise Demetrius for his dallying and watched him harshly. Silently warning him.

Demetrius desperately latched to the hope he could find a way out for all of them and found himself automatically boarding the vehicle. If only to escape his father's gaze if he couldn't escape all-together.

—

The gaping wound in the apartment drew Damian's eyes first when he emerged from the bedroom. It was shrouded in dust and veiled in light smoke, and yet the fuzzy street lights still managed to show through. He shouldn't be able to see them from where he stood.

The flames were near non-existent and Damian was hardly able to comprehend the scene before him. He saw the broken room, the dismantled furniture, and Forger's parents on the floor. In a daze, he managed to pull his shirt over his mouth and nose against the debris and smoke, and he knew he was doing it. But the actions didn't feel his own. The room was a mess, the situation was a mess. But. . .it couldn't be real. This wasn't happening. It was a dream.

Distantly, he watched Forger kneeling by her mother who wasn't moving. He should go over there. He should say something. Shouldn't he? They needed to leave. Find a safer place. His feet couldn't find the need to move. To force his body to work with his muddled mind.

The Forgers weren't moving.

Demetrius was here. Checking on Forger's parents and. . .doing something. Taking something from Mrs. Forger? What was he doing with Mr. Forger's gun? Damian wondered absently. It was broken now. Useless.

And then there were people. His brother leading him by his hand which was good, because Damian didn't think he'd be able to move on his own. It was tight. Damian's tiny hand was crushed beneath his brother's and he was somehow more distressed rather than relieved when the grip slightly relaxed. He should be glad for the pain in his hand to alleviate and it only scared him further as his tether to something solid, something secure, grew looser in it's hold around him. Damian held harder himself, though it wasn't enough until Demetrius' firm grasp naturally returned.

And then their father.

In some small capacity, Damian felt he should have known that he would be waiting for them. To take advantage of such an event. To manifest from the darkness like an evil spirit, a spectre that thrived on fear and and chaos to seize upon the cracks of vulnerability that Damian suddenly felt himself entirely comprised of. His father had watched them near. Knowing his sons had nowhere else to go but to him. His form slowly growing clearer against the shadows that seemed to linger near him as if they belonged to him. As if they had carried him here and could carry him away. As if his very existence was knit from it's wool and his physical body was merely a vessel to fulfill his wishes. As if all of his secrets—that Damian was sure there were more of he didn't know about—lived in these shadows, in the dead of night.

As if he was one with it and could swallow Damian whole if he so desired.

Maybe it was the last of the dust that still waited to settle that made his father so seamlessly blend in the darkness. Maybe it was the lack of stars tonight, the street lights that seemed especially and strangely dull. The lights fixed to the police cars may have lended some illumination to brush against the man's features, but it only served to make him seem eerier. Maybe it was all in Damian's head, but he couldn't shake the uncomfortable pull at his nerves, looking at his father—with no small amount of dread-filled surprise—who's black eyes only aided the illusion of some entity who stood there, who waited like he had always stood there. That he had always existed in a plane of shadows that Damian was previously not aware of.

Maybe it was the fears and revelations Damian had recently accumulated of his father that manifested these ideas.

He didn't like it.

Damian had become more acquainted with fear in the past couple months than he ever would have liked. It had seeded all throughout him, embedded just underneath his skin and primed to blossom at the first touch of unease or unsettling disquiet. The seeds sprouting at the first hint of anything amiss or distressing.

They bloomed now like vines squeezing his limbs and pricking it's thorns into his flesh in warning. Each step closer was another inch gained by the vines, gripping and tearing at him with it's strength.

When had Damian begun to fear his father? When had he become so scary? Was he always this scary? Damian had respected him. Admired him.

Maybe if Damian clung to that, he could forget how scary he was.

Despite the vines attached to him, despite the wretched things warning him of danger, Damian was lulled into the mindless walking that Demetrius coaxed from him. His father wasn't even looking at him. He was watching Demetrius. Watching as the paramedics looked them over. He didn't spared a glance Damian's way, and the boy had never been so glad for his father's indifference to him.

His father wouldn't look at him, but he looked to the Forgers.

The distraction of the Forgers arriving and being secured in ambulances took Damians attention with a pang of muted worry. He felt strangely detached from everything he saw like his brain was lagging behind.

The Forgers still weren't moving.

After the paramedic had wiped the blood from Anya's nose, determined that the kids were breathing properly and hadn't inhaled too much smoke or dust, and somehow got Anya to comply with the rest of the check-up despite the concerning glaze over her eyes, they were directed back to Donovan and a waiting car.

Damian wasn't sure if he should be surprised that they weren't being sent to a hospital, that the cops were perfectly fine with Anya leaving with the Desmonds, and the fact that no officers had come to speak to them or question them. That was what was supposed to happen, wasn't it? But this was his father. He tended to get what he wanted and people tended to do what he said.

Entering the car was more nerve-wracking than it should've been. It didn't help that Demetrius stopped abruptly and nearly fell off the edge of panic he'd clearly been balancing on. But he eventually had Damian get inside the fancy interior with it's cushy seating to follow after him.

There was something intrinsically disturbing about finding himself in this car again. Sitting in the well-maintained, expensive back seat that Damian realized he had become accustomed to sitting in. Damian was once again surrounded by his father's wealth and suddenly Damian desperately needed out when the doors closed and locked, trapping him inside of it. Damian had often bragged of his family's wealth and now he wanted to shed the reminder that his father was rich. That it was used to do whatever he wanted. To attain whatever he wanted, and that included silence. That included bribery and threats and blackmail and any number of things he couldn't obtain through socially acceptable means. His money and influence had penetrated anyone of authority who could help Damian before he would ever have a chance to ask for it. Donovan had cut that cord long ago without Damian even realizing. Tightly cocooning his son in the family's prestige and wealth comfortably so he wouldn't notice how dangerous it was. How suffocating.

And now he was trapped inside of it. Again.

Damian wrestled an illusion of quiet into his roaring heart and through his restless muscles on the drive to the Desmond estate. His father sat stonily in the seat in front of him rather than speak or lecture them. Instead, he let them stew in the choking tension to worry about what happened next. He spoke not a word and it was worse.

Damian glanced to Anya as he had several times now and she hadn't moved since she'd curled up in Demetrius' lap. Her eyes looked at nothing. She saw nothing. Damian was worried, though he couldn't seem to drudge his mind forward enough to do anything. He waded from one moment to the next and barely processed each moment as it happened.

The Desmond house felt bigger than Damian remembered as the car pulled up. Darker than he remembered. Daunting as it bled into the night that would've enveloped it whole if not for the front porch-lights. Chills ran freely like hyper kits up and down his body as he stepped out of the car. As he was led and shepherded indoors when a servant opened a rectangle of light to cut through the dark cloth of the mansion.

When was the last time Damian was here? He wondered numbly as someone continued to spur him up the stairs where the bedrooms lay. It couldn't have been more than four or five months, but it felt like it had been a lifetime. Oh, how much Damian had wanted to come home before.

Now it felt more like a prison.

Demetrius was directed to leave Anya in one of the bedrooms and Damian was relieved no one made him leave when he sat next to her on the bed. He would have liked to stay with Demetrius, or for Demetrius to stay with them, but Damian had a feeling his father's employees wouldn't let him.

He heard Demetrius' bedroom door lock from the outside.

Damian knew Anya wouldn't notice. He knew she wouldn't respond. But he took her hand in his own shaking one, needing the warmth. The comfort. The companionship. He could admit he needed it. He could admit he was scared and she was the only person he had to hold onto at the moment. To ground him to the earth.

BANG!

He jolted as he heard Demetrius scream and punch the wall, making both of their rooms shudder.

Damian held Anya's hand tighter.