CHAPTER 3-6
Phoenix
As his teammates moved off into the forest on their way back to Prisoners' Point and Phoenix was settling into the sand nearest the dock, resigning himself to what would likely pan out to be a devastatingly boring and lonely afternoon in his role as official flag guard, he chanced to look up and noticed that Áthas was returning through the narrow gap into the woods that the others had just taken and was now walking towards him.
He curiously observed her approach, and then, when she was close enough to be within easy earshot over the waves, queried, "Not going with them?"
She shook her head as she sat down beside him in the sand. "Nah. I have to choose one or the other flag to referee, and I'm choosing this one." She delivered this last part with a warm smile.
Phoenix didn't say anything. He could feel the warmth of that smile on his right shoulder the way he could feel the warmth of the sun's rays overhead, and ordinarily would have reveled in the attention, but for once, his mind was elsewhere. Because it was starting to become clear to him the degree to which he struggled with even temporary separation from his brother, and he wondered how he had never noticed this phenomenon before; perhaps it was because it so rarely occurred nowadays. Since their reunion two years prior, they had seldom been parted: they lived together, worked together, and, of course, traveled together.
Part of the parental role he felt responsible for fulfilling dictated that, in time - likely sometime soon, in fact - he would need to let Heinrich go, to allow him space to make his way in the world as his own person instead of as a forever-child. But how - how could Phoenix let go when it was such a miracle that they had even found each other again on this vast continent? A miracle that somehow, in some way, might prove to be short-lived? The sensation of a burning pressure against his chest from earlier now returned, or perhaps it had never left.
He stared at the edges of the forest ahead without really seeing it at all and, unconsciously hoping for an easing of that pressure against his ribcage, he sighed heavily, not realizing he had done so.
"Would you prefer it if I left you alone?" It was Áthas; he had momentarily forgotten she was even there. Her tone, thankfully, did not sound as though she had taken offense.
"No, I'm sorry. I was just thinking, that's all."
"Always a dangerous endeavor, that thinking," she noted in a flawless deadpan.
A surprised chuckle bubbled out of him and he looked over to her briefly. "Please do stay, then. I'd much rather laugh at sarcastic jokes than stare off into space while waiting for something to happen. Or think about things that I don't want to think about."
"Very well," she agreed lightly, as if she hadn't already just stated that she'd chosen to spend some time with him. More seriously, she continued, "Though I know a heavy, world-weary sigh when I hear one. Is there anything you'd like to talk about? If not, I don't mind just sitting here quietly, either."
It was a very kind gesture, that latter point - many people feared even a companionable sort of silence, and it was refreshing to learn that Áthas evidently did not - and a feeling of lightness bloomed in his chest, causing the unwelcome pressure to relent just slightly. "It's my brother," he said at length.
"Heinrich?" He could hear the bewilderment in her voice without even looking over at her. "What about him?"
Phoenix was about to reply, "I miss him so much," but stopped himself upon realizing how ridiculous that sounded. "I - I don't know if you could understand."
He felt her shift in the sand beside him. "Try me."
He sighed again. "Okay. Well, the fact is..." He squirmed, then propped his legs up to rest his forearms on his knees. "The fact is, I kind of miss him." Truth be told, it wasn't a "kind of" kind of missing that he was feeling, but that weak wording was the best he could manage to reveal for now.
"You miss him?" she echoed. Again, the evident confusion in her tone. Though instead of expressing skepticism of such a seemingly odd statement, she asked, "Why do you feel that way?"
It was a relief that she was trying to understand, instead of just writing it all off as absurd. And with that relief came a sudden need to tell her everything, unload all of the burdens he had been carrying for so long, that he hadn't told anyone since being temporarily marooned at Solas Base four years ago with a mysterious girl who had ultimately come to be his dearest friend. Quite simply, there hadn't been anyone else to tell since Solas, and so he had carried those burdens alone.
"Heinrich and I were separated after the cataclysm," he began, looking down at his bare shins and their generous allotment of freckles: a celestial map he knew as well as the night sky. "Our parents were killed by the meteorites, and not long after, I was conscripted into the Imperial Army. Heinrich was only six years old and all alone for who knows how long until he was shipped off to an orphanage. We were separated for years and I traveled all over Europa for a long, long time trying to find him." He reflexively ran a hand through his hair in an attempt to settle his nerves. "By some miracle, I managed to do just that only a couple of years ago. We've scarcely been parted since. He grew up without me, you know? I feel like I'm still learning who he's become in our time apart, and because our mum and dad are gone, I feel like I need to be not just his brother, but his parent." He sighed. "To try to make up for all that he lost."
"Oh, Phoenix," Áthas murmured softly. "That is such a sad story. I'm so sorry you both had to go through all that."
Phoenix didn't know what to say in reply to this. He swallowed and looked down at the sand below his bent legs. There was a dull gray stone there, half-buried. He still wasn't used to talking about any of this, with anyone. It had been hard enough with Willow.
"If you don't feel comfortable being apart from him, then it can certainly be arranged that you two will stay together for any other activities we do that require teams," Áthas reassured him. "It's no trouble at all."
"That's just it." He ran an agitated hand through his hair again. "He's fifteen now, not the little kid he was when the cataclysm happened. It's like, for me, who he was then was frozen in time the day of the cataclysm. But that's not how it works, and now he needs room to find his own way instead of having me hovering anxiously over him all the time, trying to undo, well...undo a past that can't be undone."
"You two are very close, aren't you?"
Phoenix again wondered what others were seeing that he did not. It felt, sometimes, like Heinrich kept him at arm's length, and Phoenix never knew if that were something personal against him, or merely a product of the traumatic experiences Heinrich had endured. Or perhaps something else entirely?
"I wish we were," he muttered in response.
If Áthas had been about to say anything else, Phoenix was not to hear it, for a movement amidst the trees at the forest's edge caught his eye and he looked up. Dark turquoise hair: Fynn.
Not Heinrich.
Something twisted deep in Phoenix's gut. He had been so hopeful.
He stood, brushed sand off of himself, and glanced backwards once to confirm that the flag, a faded red old t-shirt looped onto one of the dock's pilings, was still there, and that there was no other way to approach it besides through him, standing at the dock's landward end. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Áthas standing too, and backing up to allow space for whatever was about to happen.
Fynn approached carefully, carrying himself hunched forward a bit in a ready sort of stance - the faster to pivot and change direction, Phoenix thought. Fynn lunged a couple of times to the left or to the right as if about to dash around and past him, testing out his opponent's reflexes and speed. Phoenix matched the lunges roughly equally, and even though he had come well out from the dock's landward end now, Fynn would have to possess a great deal more speed than he had yet evidenced to get around Phoenix to the flag, to say nothing of escaping back to his home base on Prisoners' Point with it, which was the game's victory condition.
The sandy terrain made secure footing impossible, and quick changes of direction dangerous because of how easily one could fall, but this affected Fynn just as much as himself. Moving backwards slowly toward the dock to match Fynn's advances, Phoenix watched the boy warily, eyes flicking back and forth between his legs, which would lead any new motions, and the direction of his gaze, which would likely betray where he was planning on heading next.
Fynn then made his strongest move yet, by feinting to Phoenix's right but then lunging left with surprising dexterity, and, with arms pumping furiously, he sprinted towards the dock.
Phoenix hadn't been quite as agile in mirroring Fynn's directional change - the traitorous sand had shifted so much that he'd nearly fallen to his knees - but he recovered quickly and immediately dashed off to cut off his opponent's access to the dock.
He got there just in time, causing Fynn to wheel nimbly away and move a safe distance up the beach towards the tree line. Phoenix just stood there, panting from the mental strain more than the momentary exertion, and watched as Fynn, evidently deciding a new plan of attack was needed, retreated back into the woods and was soon lost to sight.
"Well, that was exciting," Áthas said, coming back over to stand beside him. "What do you think he'll try next?"
"I don't know," Phoenix admitted, his eyes still roving the tree line in search of any further developments. "He's a lot faster than I thought he'd be. Hopefully whatever he's planning for the next attempt won't exploit that fact."
The waves breathed quietly behind them. Phoenix was just starting to get his own breath back - and just starting to feel nervous again about Áthas' nearness.
She turned to face him, making him feel as though he'd quite lost his breath again. "I think you're an amazing big brother," she said, looking somewhere past him for a moment, but then snapping her eyes abruptly to his. "It's so obvious to everyone but you, I think, just how amazing you are. Heinrich doesn't just respect you, he adores you." Her voice rose a bit as she warmed to her theme. "You've both been through so much and each of you is trying so, so hard to be the best brother you can be for the other. I think that's incredible."
"Thank you," Phoenix said thickly, deeply moved by these words.
"I don't think it's a miracle at all that you found him, actually. Calling it a miracle implies that it was merely some extraordinary cosmic good luck. But that's not what it was, was it?" She looked past him once more and then back up into his increasingly wet eyes. "You found Heinrich because you never gave up looking for him. Because he means the world to you."
Phoenix could only nod, because he didn't trust his voice right at this moment. He took a deep, steadying breath, and finally said, "You're something else, Áthas."
"I know," she chirped brightly, grinning at him.
He terribly wanted, right at this moment, to put his arms around her, this woman who seemed to have known exactly what his unhappy heart needed to hear, but he didn't know if such a gesture would be welcome, and so he instead settled for one more "Thank you." He turned and started shuffling off back towards his post at the landward end of the dock.
And that was when he noticed:
The flag was gone.
