"Lass, it's only Tuesday! You're posting too early!"
I KNOW
IT'S MY BIRTHDAY
AND I WANT TO CELEBRATE BY MAKING YOU ALL FEEL SAD THINGS
BAHAHAHAHAH
(sorry)
Also, thank you so much to Psy-Kick, Ellis Tobias, Nora97, PhantomLordHelix and to Ellie for the reviews! I am so happy that you are enjoying the story and your support eans so much to me :)
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Damian stared at the ceiling. He had been lying with his eyes closed for what felt like a million years, waiting for sleep to claim him, but as usual, it never did. So, he resorted to staring at the ceiling in total numbness, ticking over everything that he could think of.
His father had chosen to come to the Imperial Ball after all, bringing with him a suit of bodyguards.
Demetrius was a test subject, and a successful telepath. He could even project his thoughts, like Anya could. (He tried not to think of how much it stung that he had not seen his brother in years, and yet Dememtrius did not say a single thing out loud to him at all.)
Be careful, little brother.
Be careful... Of what? Demetrius' words made no sense. Not what he said to Damian, or what he had said to Anya either. They had spent too many hours on the phone trying to figure it out together, but it was a futile attempt.
But there was one thing that they agreed on, which was that Donovan knew more about Anya than either of them had predicted.
"It feels like… they were testing us," said Anya at one point. She said it so tentatively, like she was afraid of Damian's reaction. "Or testing me. Papa thinks the same, too."
Damian couldn't stop wondering why .
And then… images of Anya barging into the room where his father had trapped him with his heavy gaze and his strange, terrorising monologue. Damian remembered the blood on her shoes. The torn patches of her dress. The sweat curling the tiniest strands of hair at the back of her neck. Wood shrapnel flew out from behind her, light covered her, and behind her, two men lay unconscious. He didn't want to think of what Anya could have done to them, but no matter how he thought of it, he couldn't undo the image, or the thought.
Anya has a body count.
She didn't seem… fazed… in the same way that he thought most people would be if they were in a situation that had forced them to do horrible things. She held herself together, and didn't fall apart afterwards, like he no doubt would have.
When Damian first realised it, he was awestruck. Anya really was a living weapon. He hadn't asked her about it yet. It didn't seem like something he could bring up over the phone, not when there was every risk that there could be someone listening in, waiting to report on the next thing.
Not for the first time, Damian wondered what it truly meant to be a Forger. Cognitively, he knew that being a spy, assassin, and a telepath would come with their own risks and dangers, but it had not quite dawned on him that perhaps the Forger's were much more formidable than he had ever given them credit for.
Light trickled through the curtains, illuminating the room in a subtle glow, and Damian groaned. Another sleepless night, and he had managed to lay awake overthinking everything. Again.
Without even looking, Damian grabbed the phone from his nightstand, and he typed something out before full consciousness could change his mind.
Let me know when you're awake.
Blearily, Damian threw the cover from him. Bare feet met cold marble, and Damian shivered involuntarily before he padded his way to the kitchen.
It was as he had left it the day before. Dishes piled in the sink that he didn't have the energy to clean. Last night's takeaway lay on the countertop, congealed and uneaten.
Damian ignored the mess, and reached into the fridge for the milk, drinking some straight from the carton first, then pouring it in a bowl along with some flavourless cereal, branded with words like 'healthy' and 'full of fibre' down the side of the box. He managed to swallow a few spoonfuls, before the sick feeling returned, and even cereal was just too nauseating to tolerate.
Damian poured the remaining milk down the drain, flicked the soggy, uneaten flakes back into the bin, and put the bowl on top of the other dishes. He peeked out from between the curtains, and his stomach dropped to see the same thing that he had been seeing for the past week.
There they were, camping outside, undeterred by the snow rapidly gathering around them. Waiting for him to emerge, cameras at the ready. Waiting for him to make a mistake. Waiting for him to show his face. After all, he was a legal adult. Nothing could stop them, now that the school had dismissed its students for the holidays.
It had been nearly two weeks, and Damian had had enough, but there was nothing that he could do to stop the invasion. Even worse, he couldn't stop thinking about the last exchange that he had with his brother, the last time they had spoken.
It took days for the police to release Demetrius from questioning, and when Damian tried to call him, he picked up on the second ring.
Fucking typical .
"Hello?"
" Please tell me that you're going to explain everything to me," Damian hissed into the receiver, not even waiting for an introduction. "What the fuck , Demetrius?"
Clinical silence on the other end.
"Is this Damian I'm speaking to?"
Damian inhaled a sharp breath.
"Was that not enough of a clue for you? You can't seriously recognise the sound of your brother's voice? I mean - I know its been literally years since you last spoke to me, but you could have made the fucking effort you know?!"
This was bad, Damian had to rein himself in, but he didnt care.
"Well," said Demetrius in an even tone. "It could have been an impersonator trying to get more information."
Damian exploded.
"Demetrius you fucking arsehole! Get your head our of your arse already and tell me what the fuck is going on! What were you doing with him? What happened to you? Why did you both - name me heir - and why won't you talk to me?!" He sucked in another breath, ready for the tirade bursting out of him. "You had better be planning on telling me everything in the next twenty four hours because this is literally crazy and I can't take another minute of this anymore you actual arrogant bastard prick of a brother!"
Demetrius sighed. "Alright, well you've proven that you're Damian at least. What do you want?"
"You-" Damian squeaked, and then inhaled a deep breath. "WHAT THE FUCK IS HAPPENING?!"
"I can't say. Sorry," said Demetrius.
Damian exhaled sharply, doing all he could to resist the urge to scream.
But it didn't appear that Demetrius planned to say anything else, or give away any further information, and Damian sucked in a breath through his teeth, barely holding his anger back.
"Well I'm sorry I called and wasted your time. You prick ."
He was so close to just slamming the phone down and hanging up on his brother, but he heard a sigh on the other end, and he couldn't help how that made his heart jump with hope.
Stupidly, he brought the receiver back to his ear.
"Mother wants you to come home for Christmas."
A pause.
"Excuse me?!" Damian spluttered. "Is that all you have to say?"
"Family should be together at a time like this," said Demetrius, and the way he said it sounded so rehearsed that it enraged Damian even more.
"Dont fucking screw with me Demetrius. Family?" he almost laughed. "Don't give me that shit. I'm not a kid."
"Fine," Demetrius conceded. "Be that way. But Mother won't be happy about this."
Damian was silent on the phone for a moment. He couldn't believe that he had called his brother to find answers, and instead Demetrius had evaded every question he had, while giving unreasonable demands of his own.
"You can forget about me going home for Christmas," said Damian with finality. "Or at all."
"You can't stay holed up forever."
Damian rolled his eyes, somewhat revelling in the fact that Demetrius couldn't see him do it.
"Damian, I can practically hear you rolling your eyes at me."
Damian flushed. "How did you-" he whirled around panicked. "Are you watching me?"
Is he nearby?
Is he reading my mind?
"No, you're just entirely too predictable," Demetrius drawled.
Sweat prickled at the back of Damian's neck. Because then there was the other thing: Demetrius was like Anya. He could read minds. If Damian went home, if he saw Demetrius again, he would be risking everything that was in his mind. Demetrius could find out what he knew about Anya - and her family.
"I'm staying at the Forger's for Christmas," Damian repeated the same lie that he had given to Jeeves. "They already invited me."
They had invited him. That was true, at least.
Demetrius tsked . "You should be home."
"No," said Damian with finality. "If you need anything from me, just call. You already said that you're not planning on telling me anything, and that you don't want to talk, so what's the fucking point?"
Demetrius was silent, unreadable. He doubted that Demetrius expected him to refuse. If they were speaking face to face, Damian wondered if he would at least be able to read Demetrius' facial expression.
"Is there a reason that you're hiding from us?"
Damian couldn't help it. He laughed. It was an empty laugh. A weary exhalation that merely resembled a laugh because what the fuck was he meant to say to that?
" I'm hiding from you? " he spluttered. "This is the first time we have talked in years and you're blaming me for hiding from you? You knew where I was the whole time! You could have called any time before now!"
As soon as it was out of his mouth, Damian knew that it was the truth. " You've been the one hiding from me ."
They had turned their backs on him a long time ago. Abandoning him completely.
Dark spots emerged in his vision, and Damian decided it was enough.
"I'm done with this. Let me know when you're ready to talk. I'm not going home until you tell me the truth."
Silence on Demetrius' end.
Damian was tempted to put the phone down, but he was curious enough to hang on for Demetrius' last word.
"We'll talk after you graduate," said Demetrius in a clipped tone.
And then he hung up.
Damian stared at the receiver with his mouth wide open, as the dial tone rang loudly through the receiver.
"That motherfucker! " he screamed, and tried to slam the receiver back into the hold, as if he was the one that had hung up first. "I'll hang up on you! Arsehole!"
He ground his teeth together, hand frozen in place on the phone.
"Motherfucking arsehole motherfucker," he hissed, shoved his hands in his pockets, and walked away.
Since that phone call, Damian did not talk to Demetrius even once. He would be damned if he would be the first to break the silence.
In the meantime, he was on his own, and it was the morning of a new day.
Mornings were the worst.
He didn't know what to do in the mornings. Thanks to the desperate paps outside, he couldn't go for a run, or even to pick up food from the shops. Even if it was a socially acceptable time to make a call, it was too early for Anya to be awake during the holidays. Or Becky.
He wasn't sure if he was allowed to call Ewen and Emile anymore. Certainly, Mrs Elman did not seem too pleased to hear from him the last time that he tried.
He couldn't watch TV - especially not in the mornings.
Human experimentation.
Alleged unethical financing.
Desmond scandal.
The news was relentless, and Damian got the sense that this particular scandal was not going to die down anytime soon, despite Professor Henderson's valiant attempt at reassurance.
Damian side-eyed the piles of homework that he had been given. He hadn't touched a single assignment since the holiday started, and every time he looked at the pile, he felt sick to his stomach. At least before the arrest, the fantastical promise of his father's recognition could spur him on, but with his father in jail, was there even any point any more?
His phone buzzed in his pocket, and Damian nearly jumped out of his skin to reach it as fast as possible.
"You're up early," he said, but he couldn't stop the edges of his lips from lifting into a small smile, even though it didn't quite reach his eyes.
"I just wanted to be the first one to wish you a 'Merry Christmas'!"
Even over the phone, Anya's excitement came through, and it warmed his heart. Hearing her voice was the only thing getting him through the days.
"Merry Christmas, Anya," he said, his voice slightly hoarse. "Are you doing anything fun today?"
As Anya detailed the plans for the day ahead, with the clumsiest details and silliest voices, Damian slowly felt the tension of the sleepless night unwinding from him. She described hearty food, sparkling decorations, and the rowdiest guests.
If he listened to his heart, he would be content to listen to her forever.
"Uncle Yuri is being a pain again," Anya admitted under her breath.
"I bet," Damian chuckled lightly as he pictured it. If the last family dinner of theirs was an absolute disaster, he couldn't imagine the tension that Anya's crazy uncle would bring.
"And it's really weird having Adrian here. I guess he feels like a cousin? Oh, and Papa says that the invitation is still open. It would be nice to see you before school starts again."
Damian sighed. "Tell Pops that I'm grateful. But I have to be at home."
Plus, he couldn't bring the press to Anya's doorstep. He would just be a burden on her and her entire family.
"So," said Anya, drawing out the vowel to a more 'oooh' sound. "What are your family traditions like?"
"Er…" Damian wracked his brain for something to say, but came up blank. "We don't really have any Christmas traditions."
"What?!" Anya was aghast. "Your family doesn't do anything special?"
Damian's leg shook, and he put one hand on his knee to stop it.
"Anya," he sighed. "You don't have to try so hard for me. It's alright."
A pause, and he heard her exhale through the receiver.
"Sorry. It's just… I feel guilty. I feel bad that I get to be with my family for Christmas while your dad is…"
She didn't need to finish that sentence. It was an unequivocal fact that his father would be detained for the foreseeable future, having been deemed far too dangerous to be allowed to roam while an active court case tried to prosecute him.
"Well, I have my mother and brother," Damian cleared his throat before his croaky voice could give him away. "So it's not the worst."
"What's… that like?"
"Er," said Damian. He was grateful that she wasn't around to read his mind at that moment in time. "Demetrius is a pain in the arse," he said truthfully. "He wants to talk about… the estate. And mother." Also not a full lie.
After an uncomfortable beat of silence, Damian took a swift breath, and forced himself to pull himself together.
"The cooks are really talented. They've always made really lovely Christmas dinners. With all the trimmings. Mother usually lets go of whatever diet she's on so she can actually have some. Demetrius can find it in himself to compliment the food. But that's really it. The meal is the one thing that ties us together, and then we drift off and do our own thing."
"What will you do?"
"Probably…" Damian closed his eyes to imagine. "I'll take the horses out. I don't get a chance to go out on them often. There's an amazing trail nearby through the forest. In the winter it's like something out of a fairy tale."
"I'd love to see it one day."
"You will," Damian promised her confidently. "I'll take you. We can watch the sunrise together. The light just… It filters through the crystals of ice and snow like nothing you've ever seen. The fractals create prisms of light, and if you look really closely there can be a small rainbow hue."
"Wow," Anya breathed, before she settled into awed silence. "That sounds amazing."
"It is."
"It's just a shame that you have to get up early for it…"
At that, Damian let out a small chuckle. "It's really worth it."
He wished he could talk to her forever. Every time he talked to her, he could feel lighter. After some time, Damian got the feeling that he was pulling Anya away from her family, and he didn't want to do that. He wanted her to have an enjoyable, memorable day.
"Say 'hi' to your family for me," said Anya, and Damian coughed.
"Y-yeah. Will do."
Once they said their goodbyes, Damian pressed the button to end the call, and let out a deep breath. It was the only sound in the otherwise empty apartment.
Damian wondered if it was too early for a strong drink, but eventually decided against it. If everything in his life was falling apart, he couldn't let himself fall apart too. He wandered back into the kitchen and poured himself a cup of tea.
An hour later, and that cup of tea remained on the countertop. Stone cold. Untouched.
Hours passed, and Damian whittled away his time staring at the walls and overthinking some more, all the while doing everything he could to resist turning on the TV. It was too unpredictable: it could be the ultimate distraction, or it could be the ultimate reminder. He couldn't take that chance.
The apartment was too bare for it to be furnished with anything of interest, and Damian wished that he had thought to at least bring some books. The pile of homework sat untouched, and Damian was pretty sure that it was giving him the side-eye, too.
In the late afternoon, he managed to have a short call with Becky, if just to get some more contact with the outside world. Apparently, her father had put her to work in the family business, and her days were too busy and filled with back-to-back corporate garbage to even spare the five minutes for a call. From what he heard from Anya, Becky hadn't even managed to spare time to contact her.
And yet, Becky inexplicably made time for him. It was enough for him to actually start calling her 'Becky' in his head, instead of the usual 'Blackbell'.
They never spoke about his father, or at least, she never asked.
"Any word on what Emile and Ewen are up to?" he asked her. "I can't seem to get through to either of them."
"Ah," Becky said apologetically. "Yeah. About that…"
Damian's chest tightened with unease.
"Their parents have instructed the house staff to, er, divert your calls."
"Oh," said Damian.
"Yeah, " said Becky. "Sorry."
Damian didn't reply straight away. The lump in his throat had become far too big.
He should have known this would happen. That the impact of the Desmond scandal would cause ripples of such unprecedented magnitude that it would affect those closest to him first. But still, the idea that the parents of his best friends would pull away from him was a hard pill to swallow. He thought they knew him better than that.
"Desmond?"
"Er-" Damian shook himself off, and cleared his throat. "I'd better go."
"Alright," Becky conceded. "Give Anya a hug from me!"
A twang in his heart.
"Yeah, will do." he inhaled a deep breath. "Merry Christmas, Blackbell."
"Merry Christmas."
Damian ended the call, and once again the silence of the apartment took over him. It was bad enough that he had lied to Jeeves and Demetrius and his mother about where he was, but the lying didn't seem to stop there. He just had to go ahead and tell Becky the same lie, and all the while, he hadn't said a thing to Anya.
Snow continued to build on the sill outside, and it had grown considerably in size when his phone rang once again, and Damian accepted the call without much thought.
"Hey," he said, and immediately his voice had taken on a softer tone. "Twice in one day? You're too generous."
"I missed your voice," Anya said on the other end of the line. " And I miss you."
"I miss you too," he said quietly. He wanted to tell her to go back to her family, to not worry about him, but Damian wondered if, maybe, he could be allowed to be selfish for a bit.
They stayed on the phone together for some time, talking about everything and nothing. The topic didn't matter so much to him, as much as the fact that they were just talking, when she didn't have to. Anya actually had a family to go back to, yet she chose to give her time to him.
They were on the phone for nearly an hour before Damian heard a knock at the door.
"Wait a second Anya, I need to get this -"
Did he order another takeaway? He had forgotten. All the days blended into each other.
Damian kept his phone in one hand while he swiped the lock with the other, and opened the door quickly.
The man standing before him was not who he expected.
And, Damian quickly realised that he didn't want to see him.
Damian slammed the door shut.
"I suppose I deserved that," came the resigned voice from the other side.
"What - how -" Damian couldn't reconcile it, and then he realised that he had not ended the call with Anya. "Anya - I - gotta go -"
He clicked it off, and slumped against the back of the door with a heaving sigh.
"I suppose you guys figured me out, huh?" he sighed, and then opened the door again. "Come in."
Loid peered at Damian curiously as he stepped through the threshold of the flat, all the while keeping a slight distance from Damian. "Sorry for dropping in on you like this."
"Is that all?" Damian asked, only realising after he said it just how much like his father he sounded. "Don't you have something else to apologise for?"
Damian let the words sink into the air as Loid stared at him, temporarily confused.
"Why didn't you tell me?" Damian said quietly, trying to stop himself from shaking. "Why didn't you tell me? "
Loid softened, and the meaning of Damian's words finally reached him. "You know I couldn't."
"You could have warned me what would happen."
"It was a risk I couldn't take."
"No you couldn't, so you just made Anya do your dirty work for you. She had to be the one to tell me, but it should have been you. "
Damian gritted his teeth, hating how weak and pathetic he sounded, because this was the other reason that he couldn't let himself take them up on their offer to have him for Christmas. It felt like a betrayal to himself. Dr Forger had orchestrated his father's arrest - and had unintentionally plunged him into the ravenous media pit at the same time.
In some ways, Damian knew that it wasn't Dr Forger's fault - because it was his job . He was trying to protect the country, and Damian knew that he couldn't be arrogant enough to think that his personal feelings mattered more than the peace of an entire nation, but he could have at least done more to shield Damian from the damage.
"You could have said something!" Damian raised his voice. "At least then I could have been - I could have been ready -"
As quickly as it appeared, Damian found that he could not find it in himself to stay angry. He didn't have the energy, and truthfully, he didn't want to stay angry at the man in front of him when he had only just started to call him 'Pops'. His circle was small enough as it was, the thought of pushing him away was just too much to handle.
"I can't even leave this building without them chasing after me," he said quietly. He flicked the curtain back, to see the horde of paparazzi camped outside. "That would have been good to know."
"I am sorry for what happened," Loid said, genuinely. "I wish there could have been another way."
"You got what you wanted though, right?" said Damian faintly. "You got my father arrested. Your investigation is over."
"What I want has never mattered. It's about what has to be done."
"Right," Damian pressed his lips together. "So what do you want with me now? You don't need to talk to me anymore. It's all over."
A guilty look crossed his face before Loid smiled apologetically at Damian.
"I was thinking you could join us for Christmas."
Damian blinked. And he hated that his eyes stung. He turned away from Loid before anything else could show on his face.
"Anya misses you terribly. I know it's not the best circumstances, but it would really mean the world to her. And if I'm being honest, Yor and I both agree that family dinners just aren't the same without you there."
Damian tried to breathe over the lump in his throat. It wasn't fair, how it could come out of nowhere like that.
He hurriedly wiped at his eyes.
"I guess I could spare a few hours..."
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Writing this made me feel sad. Or rather, I had to be sad to write this.
I just feel so bad for all of them, honestly 😭
Tonight, I am going to go out to Eat Food and Get Drunk as a birthday celebration, which is also kind of why I am posting early because I will be useless after that 😂
Also this chapter now passesthe Seven Secrets of Starlight into 300k words! Insane!
Next chapter on Christmas (Monday)
(Because on Tuesday I will be on a plane and on Wednesday I will be on holiday woo!)