Disclaimer: This is a work of fiction. The authors claim no ownership of the characters within, nor received any compensation for this work.
The first thing Cye noticed was something tickly scratching his cheek. He groaned and pushed himself upwards, eyes focusing on lush, summer grass. He sat up gingerly, wincing at aching limbs. He'd forgotten how uncomfortable sleeping in sub-armor was.
Sub-armor.
In a summer field.
When they hadn't needed the armor since Talpa's defeat, and the season was late fall. And his last remembered location was an alley behind a club. An alley with....
He looked around wildly, fighting a rising sense of panic, and his eyes settled on a familiar head of silky red hair. The boy was lying in a hollow a few feet away, covered in a long, dark trench coat, cradling a sheathed katana like it was a baby. Or a tie to sanity. Cye levered himself to his feet, forcing himself to process one thought at a time.
Fact one: the sky was blue and a warm yellow sun hung about a quarter of the way off the horizon. Conclusion: this is not the Nether Realm. Fact two: he had no memory of getting here, and even the last few minutes in the alley was hazy. Fact three: the pretty redhead claimed to not believe in magic. Tentative conclusion: he got dragged wherever this was too. Thoughts a little more in order, Cye walked towards the stranger. This was not definitely not how his night was supposed to happen...
No, he thought sourly, his night was supposed to be about dancing, having fun with his friends and luring this utterly beautiful young man into bed. Or failing that, go home and screw the hell out of his friends. He was not supposed to be trapped in Never-Never Land.
He reached towards the other's trenchcoat sleeve, intending to shake him softly, when he suddenly vaulted backwards. The stranger had gone from completely prone to a full lunge in barely a breath. Cye flipped backwards to avoid being skewered by the now unsheathed katana speeding towards him. Thank God old reflexes die hard, he thought, dodging another thrust.
"Stop it!" Cye exclaimed, lunging to the slide as the katana whined towards his midsection. This is insane, he thought. I'm not going to hurt him, he reminded himself firmly, dodging another thrust. He's just a guy. I can't go after him like I would a Dynasty soldier, even if the idiot is trying to kill me. He threw his arm up and caught the edge of the blade on his forearm. They strained that way for a moment; the hard-eyed redhead trying to overpower Cye, and Cye having a violent flashback to the innumerable times he'd been in this very position. He looked into the violet eyes. They were flat and a little unfocused, almost like the boy was in a state of shock. He'd probably attacked on waking more from reflex than anything.
Enough!" Cye shouted again. With a twist of his arm, the blade slid along the armor towards his hand with a horrid metal screech. A flick of the wrist saw the blade trapped in Torrent's metal cased hand and wrenched out of it's wielder's grip. "I am not your enemy! I didn't bring us here, I don't even know where here is. So," he said, calming a little and lowering the trapped blade. "If you want to get back I suggest you calm right the hell down."
The redhead looked at him for a moment and the glacial eyes came completely into focus. He gave a short nod and held out one gloved hand silently, waiting for Cye to return his weapon. It was sheathed just as silently upon return.
Cye blew out a breath of relief. "Thank you," he said, exasperated. "Now, I don't know where we are or how we got here. This isn't the Nether Realm as near as I can tell. Don't ask," he said in response to the sour look on the other's face, "I'll explain later. The best plan would probably be just to start walking. I'd recommend west, we'll have more daylight that way."
~*~*~*~
As it turned out, they seemed to have nothing but daylight. The summer day wore on as they walked, through endless fields of tall grasses. Long rushes and reeds reached as high as Aya's knees at times, tangling his heavy boots. The weather was perfectly balmy in this wherever-they-were, warm and just slightly humid. Under the heavy leather trenchcoat and his typical mission clothes, he was starting to sweat.
However, every time he glanced at the boy walking a few feet to his right, he was met with hooded, sultry eyes and the most satisfied, knowing little smirk he'd ever seen. Aya narrowed his eyes, frowned, even growled at him once. It only made the boy smile wider, or flip tousled auburn hair, or worse yet, cast a long and pointed look down Aya's entire body. If it weren't for that strange armor clinging to every part of him, Aya would have no compunctions against drawing his sword on the young lecher.
His gloved hand clutched the katana hilt tightly. The boy was looking at him again, he knew it. He could hear the appreciative little sigh when he turned his head to scout the horizon again. A rush of frustration boiled up inside him, sparked somewhere between the infuriatingly unchanging landscape, and his equally maddening companion. Aya unsheathed the blade, and sliced out at the hapless savannah grasses that insisted on tangling up between his trenchcoat and his trousers.
"You're only going to get yourself hotter by doing that, pretty," suggested the boy, not bothering to conceal the laughter in his voice. "Not that you really need to..."
Aya shot him a withering glare, ignoring the innuendo. "Do not call me that."
The other merely shrugged. "I can't think of anything better to call you. Have any suggestions?"
This cheeky boy was definitely starting to get under Aya's skin. He knew Aya wouldn't stand for an endearment like that, and then had all but tricked him into giving up his name. Now he was looking expectant, one eyebrow arched in a completely infuriating manner. "Aya," the swordsman snapped out finally.
"Aya?" The boy looked surprised, momentarily taken aback. Aya enjoyed only a brief moment of triumph before the slow smile was back in place and the boy was purring at him again. "Very pretty. It suits you. You're pretty like a girl."
"I am not."
Ignoring his furious rebuttal, his companion continued blithely, "It's very nice to meet you properly, Aya. My name is Cye. I did mean to ask you earlier, in the club, but you..."
"We will not discuss that." As far as Aya was concerned, that ended the topic. Whatever had passed between them in the club had nearly gotten him killed, lingering in his mind when he should have been focused on the mission. It was a weakness and a liability, and Aya preferred to forget about it completely.
Cye just laughed, continuing to walk along as if the conversation were not the least bit strange. He even seemed to be enjoying it. "Won't we, then? Oh, yes, I forgot, you don't believe in magic and superstition. So I suppose our being here and not getting anywhere for all this walking is perfectly... wait." He stopped suddenly still, head tilted back with his small snub nose in the air.
Aya stopped as well, eyeing the boy. Though he had been nothing but provocative and needling since his first words, Aya had to admit that Cye seemed to have a better idea of what was happening to them than he did. For now, he told himself. He would get his own bearing on the situation soon enough. He was still confused from the crushing impact he'd felt in the alley, that was all.
Cye looked back at him after a moment, pointing just off to their left, to where a small rise hid the horizon. "Let's head over there. I think I smell something."
Aya opened his mouth to object, but one glance around at the endless grassland through which they'd been trudging silenced him. At least Cye's suggested direction was discernable from the rest of the landscape. So, with a brisk nod, he turned and stalked off toward the swell of land.
They topped the rise and Cye sighed in delight, "It's the ocean! We can figure out where we are now." He headed down the hill toward the beach quickly, oblivious to the sullen silence of his companion. He pelted across the sand and was soon hip deep in the surf. He half-turned and gave the surly swordsman a brilliant smile. "Don't worry mate, there's not a waterway in the world I can't identify. I'll know where we are in a jiff." And with that he turned and leapt, splitting the surface of the water and vanishing beneath the waves.
Aya had not even a moment to protest or question before Cye was completely swallowed up by the sea. In the absence of the young man's chatter, the world felt strangely silent. The ocean water lapped against the sand and a breeze brushed his ears now and then, but aside from that there was nothing. No birds, no leaves rustling, no insects buzzing. No traffic or other city-sounds, those things to which he had become so accustomed. Just himself and the ocean, and nothing else for as far as he could see.
How long he stood there, he could not tell. The breeze tousled his hair and shifted the swirls of his trenchcoat, and still Cye did not reappear. The more time went by, the further Aya's stomach started to sink. That suit of armor he was wearing was surely too heavy to swim safely in. Aya measured the minutes in breaths and heartbeats, until Cye had been gone too long to return.
Trust. He'd said he would be back. Aya could neither count on his return nor his complete disappearance. Rather than stand and stare at the sea, he turned away and began to mount the small hill over which they'd originally come...
... and found himself faced with a structure he had not seen before. A broad and sprawling house was set not far back from the beach. He strode for it quickly, working up a sweat in what must now be the late afternoon sun. By the time he had reached the front door, he had stripped out of his trenchcoat, down to the much cooler black sleeveless shirt he wore beneath it. Slinging both coat and sword over one arm, he knocked.
It seemed no surprise at all when no one answered. Even less a surprise when his twisting of the knob and shoving at the door produced no response. The house was locked, silent, and unoccupied. Therefore it was utterly useless to him.
With no options left to him, Aya drug himself back down to the beach, still carrying his coat and katana. For the third time in ten minutes, he was shocked into stillness.
Cye was walking out onto the shore from the ocean, not swimming, walking. He was striding up out of the waves as if they weren't even there. His expression was a curious mix of frustration, annoyance and pure confusion. "I don't get it," he said, looking at Aya. "We're no where, not on any ocean on Earth anyway. Don't," he said with an uncharacteristic scowl, catching Aya's silently disbelieving expression. "Don't start about not believing in magic. I'm Cye of the bloody Torrent and I always know where I am in any ocean. You're going to have to accept that wherever this is, it isn't home and we need to concentrate on getting back."
"There... is a house," Aya gave his slow, quiet reply. "Over the rise. It appears to be empty."
~*~*~*~
"A house?" Cye asked, wringing the water out of his hair and raking it back. He'd hoped the action covered the faint flush he could feel spreading over his face. He knew that now was hardly the time but every time he heard that voice reason went out the window. The clipped, efficient tones did nothing to hide the throaty power of it. He shivered, thinking of what it would sound like, hot and passion glazed. It took almost no effort to imagine the icy tones warming, murmuring all those lusty things that his Ronins so loved to hear from him. And maybe, just maybe, that marvelous liquid voice would say something sweeter.
And the shirt he was wearing ought to be declared illegal. It clung to the boy's lean frame in all the right places and left sleek swordsman's arms bare. It also left the smooth expanse of his neck uncovered and gleaming like alabaster in the afternoon sun. He swallowed hard, trying not to think of what was under that shirt.
Cye pulled himself out of his pleasant haze and smiled up apologetically. "Sorry, I'm afraid my mind was wandering a bit." He sighed at the silent glower he received in return. "It wouldn't kill you to lighten up a little, you know." He got up and started walking up the path. "Let's go see this house of yours."
A few minutes' walk saw them at the top of the small hill. A short way back was a house that made Cye's breath catch in shock. It wasn't precisely the same design as Mia's but it was close enough to be disturbing. They made their way down to the front entrance carefully. Oddly, Cye began to feel more comfortable the closer they came.
There was nothing remarkable about the building. It was large enough to comfortably house several people, but it wasn't extravagant. There was a patch of green to the side and a stone gate that suggested a garden. It was also seemingly deserted, no vehicles, no people, and no sign that either had been there at all recently. They reached the front door and Cye touched the doorknob lightly. The door obediently swung open.
"Was it locked when you came up?" Cye asked. After receiving the expected indifferent shrug he pushed the door open.
The inside was a bit of a shock. It wasn't quite Mia's manor house; there were a few additions here and there but the layout and some of the furnishings were very close. Instead of the expected cold chills, Cye felt that odd feeling of homecoming again. Leaving Aya standing on the threshold he made his way to the kitchen.
"It's all here," he muttered, wandering through the room, opening cabinets and doors. He caught Aya's odd expression out of the corner of his eye and shrugged apologetically. "It's just like the kitchen at home. All my things, or at least copies of all of them, are here. Look at this."
He opened a cabinet and took out a sky blue ceramic mug. Emblazoned on the side was a black and yellow symbol, like a yin-yang but missing the inner circles. He quickly pulled out four more mugs in a rainbow of colors, each with its own black and yellow symbol. "Our friend Mia had these made for us last year. For me and my roommates, I mean. Why would they be here?"
The cups were stashed away again, as new inspiration struck him. Cye hurried over to the sink and turned on the hot water, a little surprised when the tap started flowing normally. "Aya?" he asked, all teasing aside for once. "Can you check if it's getting hot?"
At the redhead's raised eyebrow, Cye smiled sheepishly and wiggled his armor covered fingers. "They're not really temperature sensitive."
Aya's look of surprise was enough to confirm that the water was indeed warming.
"Curiouser and curiouser, said Alice." Cye mumbled as a brief investigation showed that all appliances were functional and the cupboards and refrigerator were stocked with fresh food. "There weren't any power lines on the way, and nothing looks like it's been here for more than a day."
Not waiting for a comment from the silent Aya, Cye went out into the next room. It was the dining room, again enough like Mia's to be strange, but not exact. The den was the same way, though one feature of note was a video game array that would have sent Rowan into a frenzied orgasm but no other cables to the television. Now that he thought about it, Cye realized that there wasn't a phone in any of the usual places either. He tried to open the door to what should be Mia's study and found it firmly locked. Frowning a little he went back out into the dining room, looking for Aya.
~*~*~*~
As soon as Cye had left the kitchen, Aya decided he'd had enough of this house and the tricks it was pulling. While his companion seemed perfectly at ease, he himself felt particularly uncomfortable here. It was all too convenient, that this place just so happened to correspond almost perfectly to a place that Cye called home. That the door had opened for him, and not for Aya. Cye knew where everything was, and had wandered off without fear to explore the rest of the house. That left Aya standing in the sunlit kitchen, staring at the thing that had kept him silent since they'd entered.
A simple tin of marzipan candy sat on the counter near the sink. Though it blended with the other containers and kitchen items, the cheerful yellow tin had immediately caught his eye. He'd lived with just such a jar perpetually in a kitchen he'd once known, a constant reassurance of a normal life. Aya-chan had loved that candy, and 'kaasan had ordered it specially from someplace in Europe for every birthday and Children's Day for ten years. Aya couldn't remember the last time he'd tasted the simple, tangy treats.
Though it was such a small thing, it needled at him. Many of the accoutrements of the house were Western, so the presence of Western treats was not such a shock. If it hadn't been Aya-chan's favorite, he never would have noticed the container at all.
Cye was wandering the house, he could hear, and would be back in moments. Aya reached for the tin and uncapped it quickly, dipping his fingers in to pull out the first paper-wrapped candy he came across. It turned out to be a small marzipan peach -- only lightly flavored like the fruit it was molded after, Aya found when he popped it into his mouth. The peachy almond flavor and the smooth, mushy texture reminded him of the few candies he would sneak from Aya-chan's jar when he wasn't looking. Without thinking he nipped another out and unwrapped it; a strawberry this time.
"What's that?" Armor-encased feet clicked on the smooth kitchen floor, bringing Aya whirling around, the candy tin still in one hand. He caught Cye with the most startled expression, sea-blue eyes wide in surprise. How strange it must be to him, Aya mused, to find me caught with my hand in the candy jar.
Without a word, Aya offered the tin out to Cye, pressing the strawberry-shaped candy into his mouth. The other boy just stared for a moment, mouth hanging slightly open, with his gaze fastened on Aya's lips. Only when he pursed his mouth in a frown did Cye shake himself, and reach to accept a piece of marzipan of his own.
"So, you like sweet things," the boy purred softly, drawing a few steps closer to him. Aya pulled the candy tin back jealously, glaring a silent warning for the intruder on his personal space to keep his distance.
Cye just shook his head, wearing that same half-amused smile. "Oh, very well, then. They're all yours, Aya. Here you go." Quite unexpectedly, Cye lifted the unwrapped candy -- an apple this time -- and touched the smooth surface to Aya's lips.
Aya stared him down, refusing to open his mouth even though he could smell the faint fruity sweetness. Smiling at him, Cye ran the molded round of the candy over his lips, pressing gently. "C'mon, open up. You want to." That was logic Aya could not argue with, no matter how much the boy's familiarity put him on edge. He opened his mouth and Cye pushed the miniature apple in, withdrawing his armored fingers.
Gesturing airily, Cye turned away then, beckoning for him to follow. "Come on, let's go look upstairs. Things should get even more interesting up there."
Aya stood steadfast, refusing without words. Cye glanced at him over his shoulder, and laughed, most likely at the sight of the silent warrior standing in the sunlit kitchen and clutching a jar of candy. "Come on. You can bring your sweets if you want," he teased as one would coax a child.
With a resounding clack to be sure Cye heard, Aya dropped the tin back down on the counter and started after him.
~*~*~*~
A little tired and even more confused, Cye paused at the foot of the stairs. He started up them with a fairly good idea of what he'd find. As expected, at the top of the landing was a long hall broken by doors at regular intervals. He put a hand hesitantly on the knob of the first on the right and swung the door open.
Inside was his room.
Complete in every detail, down to the pair of bubbling aquariums and the stuffed whale that was a gift from his mother on his fifth birthday. A quick search through the dresser and closet revealed his clothes, neatly put away as they were the last time he did laundry. He chuckled to himself, more in shock than because of anything amusing, and left the room.
In the hall was Aya, standing with his back to one of the doors as if refusing to acknowledge its existence, wearing that 'I just bit into a lemon' look that he was so fond of. "Let me guess," Cye said. "You found your bedroom on the other side of the door." With a curious smile Cye turned to the next door and froze. At Mia's home this would be Kento's room but there was something about entering it that just felt... wrong.
"Aya?" he asked thoughtfully, "How many doors do you see?"
The redhead gave him another one of those narrowed-eyed scowls but finally spoke. "Five."
"Interesting, my friend. I count seven and if I'm right it's five bedrooms and two bathrooms. This is certainly a peculiar house." Torrent thought for a moment then shrugged. "I don't know about you but I'm tired, hungry and want out of the armor. Why don't we get cleaned up and I'll meet you downstairs. I can throw something together for dinner in no time."
That comment sparked and honest to goodness startled look from Aya, "You are going to use these things?"
"You ate the candy, didn't you?" Cye countered. "Someone or something went to a lot of trouble to see that we felt at home. Besides, changing to the armor shreds your clothes and I'm not going to wander around naked for however long we're here. If nothing else, I'd sunburn." He smiled softly, taking pity on the poor boy. He, much like the rest of the world, obviously had no interaction at all with magic. "It's all right," he said. "Trust me, I know when something feels dangerous. This place feels like light and home. There's nothing in here that wants to hurt us." He graced the bewildered-looking boy with another smile and vanished into his room.
~*~*~*~
Fifteen minutes later Cye was humming contentedly to himself, having taken complete charge of the kitchen. Aya stood in the doorway watching him, mystified. The auburn haired young man had taken the entire problem totally in stride and was in the midst of making dinner as though there was nothing wrong. As if he weren't in a house that shouldn't be here in the middle of this featureless, unidentifiable, uninhabited land. As if there weren't anything inherently spooky about this place which had appeared out of nowhere.
Aya looked down at the table. There were a variety of items, some Japanese, some Western and surely too much to have been put together on such short notice.
"Sit, sit," Cye said, waving towards the other chair as he took one. "It's not going to get any better on an empty stomach. I've got no idea what you like so I sort of improvised." He stabbed his fork into the greens in the salad bowl and smiled. "Cooking's a hobby," he added, taking bits of this and that, "And I can do just about anything you like. My mom's British, she's why I know how to do the Western stuff."
Aya's silence still did not phase the other young man in the least. He stood there with his arms around himself, as if chilly in just his sleeveless shirt and jeans. Cye had changed into a pair of comfortable-looking shorts and a plain t-shirt and seemed much more at home. Aya, however, still stood with his hips cocked at an awkward angle.
Cye looked over, frowning at the immobile redhead. "Aya, for pity's sake, sit down and eat. If there's nothing here you like, I'll make something else. If I can cook for all the guys and Mia I'm sure I can manage you..." Irritation drained away then, replaced for the first time by a soft confusion. He looked up into the other boy's violet eyes, "Aya, what happened? What were you and the others doing there. We..." his breath hitched and he looked down. "We saw... people in an office, dead people. The last thing I remember is being in the alley and falling." He looked back up and met Aya's eyes again, "You had the strangest expression..."
Aya slid into the only other chair at the table, shifting it with his feet so that it rested precisely across from Cye. No closer one way or the other to the boy, he met the curious gaze with his own even look. "Forget what you saw," he stated simply, reaching for a pair of chopsticks at his place setting.
Cye stared at him, aghast, though Aya only saw the expression from beneath his lashes. He was calmly dishing himself a bowl of rice and vegetables, dousing it all lightly with soy sauce. It wasn't until he'd begun to eat that Cye finally found his tongue. "Forget about it?! You were standing there with a bloody sword! There was blood on you. I can't just forget about it!" The boy paused, and leaned forward to look eagerly at him. "I know the evidence is damning, but maybe it wasn't you. Was it? Aya, did you really kill those people or not?"
A simple, negative lie would clear up the matter and Aya would be done with it. He would be absolved in his companion's eyes and the subject would disappear. Cye should not be involved in the matter even peripherally -- he had seen too much as it was. And Cye seemed all to eager to disregard the overwhelming evidence and believe Aya innocent. But even though the lie was on his lips and ready to be spoken, Aya heard his own voice say, "I did."
Cye sat back, his soft eyes widening. For a moment he looked very small, like a child who'd just been told that Father Christmas was a fairy tale. Hurt, maybe even a little betrayed. Never once, though, did he look afraid. Granted, Aya's katana was out of reach in the hall, and his hands were occupied with the rice bowl and chopsticks. He did not present a terribly menacing figure at the moment. The silence stretched on until it became clear that he was not going to say anything more.
Taking him by surprise, Cye did not explode in anger, nor provoke him, nor flee the room in horror. He only asked, in a soft but deadly serious voice, "Did they deserve it?"
Aya was met by Cye's solemn expression when he looked up from his meal. He squared his shoulders and looked the boy right in the eyes. "Yes. They conspired to create a drug which would control the minds of their patrons. Controlling their addiction to the drugs, drink, and pleasures at the club would allow them to control their actions as well. They sought to create loyally addicted minions of the most wealthy heirs in the city."
It was far more than Cye had heard Aya say in all the hours that they'd shared company. The other boy looked a bit glazed the further Aya went on in his flat-toned narrative. When he finished speaking, Cye shook himself a little and took comfort in stabbing at his salad with his distressingly Western fork. "How did you know?"
Aya countered with the question foremost on his mind for the last several hours: "How did you know where to find us?" He held his bowl and chopsticks still, with a statue's grace and immobility that often unnerved people into talking, just to get him to move or blink.
Cye fell silent at that, popping a cherry tomato covered in salad dressing into his mouth. He looked directly into Aya's eyes when he did it, unconsciously slowing the bite to wrap his lips around the vegetable. The gesture failed to unnerve Aya, or distract him from the question. Finally, Cye breathed a sigh. "We had a... warning of sorts. It wasn't anything that any one else would have heard. We went to investigate and just..." He swallowed in distaste. "Followed the trail."
"Who were your companions?"
Just like that, Aya had turned the inquisition on Cye rather than on himself. The younger boy seemed almost required to answer any question put to him, quite unlike Aya's own tactic of dodging of a question with a question.
"My friends," Cye corrected him with a gentle smile. "Brothers-in-arms, I guess you could say, though it's been ages since any of us had to carry any weapons." Aya was reminded of the quick, efficient skill with which he'd been parried and blocked, when he'd attacked the boy on first awakening. The image of the competent fighter in armor was much at odds with the talkative young man who sat across from him now.
With very little encouragement from Aya, Cye told him in depth about the other four young men he lived with and called family. Rowan, Kento, Sage, and Ryo, each with their peculiarities and quirks that Cye blithely outlined for him. "We're all very different," he said with a soft smile. "Ryo's our leader, he's the dark haired one who spoke first. He takes the most insane risks for us but they always turn out alright. Rowan and Kento have such a love for life it's amazing." He laughed, "And Sage is this quiet pillar of strength wrapped in an gleaming gold, over-controlling package." He spoke of them with the fondest wistful affection, using gentle, familiar words such as Aya might use to discuss his sister.
Aya learned that they had all been together for three years or so, bonded together against a common enemy. The trials they had faced made them closer than family, he said, to which Aya raised an inquisitive eyebrow.
"What could be closer than family?"
Cye smiled at him, a smile that came so readily and simply that Aya almost wanted to return it. "Understanding," he replied. "A soul-deep connection. Love."
Aya pressed his lips together sourly, even though the expression made Cye attempt to hide his grin behind his fork. Here he was, a total stranger, and Cye was providing him with personal details so easily. How could anyone speak so openly about the kind of connection that he claimed existed with his friends? Those few relationships that affected Aya -- his sister before she lost her smile, his silently supportive friendship with Yohji -- he could never tell to someone so unfamiliar as this boy. Yet here was Cye, cheerfully baring his deepest feelings to someone he didn't even know. Aya couldn't help but be a tad embarrassed for him.
Perhaps Cye misread the duck of Aya's chin and the quiet concentration on the fruit he'd picked up after his rice was finished. "Does that upset you, lovely? It felt so natural for us all to fall in love with each other after everything we'd been through. Maybe with five men, it seems strange, but..."
"That is your own affair," Aya cut him off briefly, separating an orange with deft, quick fingers. It was too intrusive to hear more. The more open Cye became, the more closed off Aya felt, and the weight of his own secrets pressed hard on his chest.
"So you don't mind..." Cye began, edging toward that teasingly soft tone that Aya had come to be wary of. He stopped, though, and fell silent. Aya looked up at him a moment later from beneath his bangs, catching the honestly sorry and sad expression on the other's face.
"That is your own affair," he repeated, more quietly and less sharp than a moment ago. It didn't seem to mollify the sorrow in Cye's eyes. Aya elaborated, "It is nothing by which to judge you harshly."
For a moment, the talkative young man just looked at him in surprise, though the expression quickly melted into a sort of wistful amusement. "No, Aya," said Cye quietly. "I don't think you'd judge me. You're too busy judging yourself, aren't you?"
The question came so suddenly that Aya inadvertently broke the inner skin of the orange with his finger, loosing juice and pulp to trickle its way into his palm. He quickly reached for a napkin, before either of them could entertain thoughts of cleaning him with something else. He said nothing in response.
After a few beats of silence, Cye waved a hand and scooted back his chair, lazily standing up and stretching. "Well, you can clean up then. I've been in armor all day and I think I'd like a little swim before we sleep." Before Aya could rebut that there would be nothing about sleeping from which Cye could infer a 'we', Torrent was ambling out of the kitchen. "Tomorrow we'll work on finding a way home, hm?"
And then he was gone. Aya was left with the leftovers of the meal, silence, and a rapidly darkening kitchen. Without Cye in the room, the place seemed less welcoming, somehow. When Cye treated the room like home, it was easier to think of it as a friendly place. Now it was only an unfamiliar kitchen, scattered with details that called to him like something from a half-remembered dream. Now, it seemed, the very walls were shunning him with their silence.
Without the constant of Cye's chatter, everything was quiet. Distantly, the lap of the ocean touched the beach , but not a single bird or cricket welcomed the growing evening outside the windows. Even the appliances in the kitchen failed to hum with electricity, though they had been tested by Cye and proved to be in working order. The house did not settle or creak. No distant music or television sounded from the upstairs rooms, as it would at Aya's apartment. No telephones ringing for Yohji, no trace of Ken's pounding feet, no restless creaking indicating Omi was still awake.
For all that Aya often wished for simple, uninterrupted silence, the reality of it struck him as eerie. He found himself more satisfied when his chair scraped across the tile floor when he stood, and when the bowls and utensils clanked together as he cleaned up. He left the kitchen faucet on just to combat the unsettling silence of the otherwise empty house. He got the distinct, inexplicable feeling that without Cye, this room simply did not like him.
Aya vacated the kitchen as quickly as he could, when the process of cleaning up a dinner made for him in a kitchen he'd never seen, in a house that shouldn't exist, in a place he couldn't identify, struck him as futile. He knew he could not go upstairs to the room that waited for him, mocking him with its exact similarity to his own. So he took up his katana, clutching the sheathed blade in one hand for safety against a nonexistent enemy, and left the house.
~*~*~*~
Cye sat on the empty beach, watching the sun slowly set. For some reason, after he'd come out he was content to simply sit and watch, drinking in the silence. He looked out over the flaming horizon and sighed. His friends' presence were a bare whisper in his mind, enough to reassure him that somewhere they were all safe, but not enough to keep the aching loneliness at bay. It had been years since the threads of self that were spun between them had been so thin. He finally forced himself to turn his attention away from the shining, interwoven connection. They were alive and well and he had more immediate problems.
Their location wasn't half the problem that his companion was. Cye had started teasing him as a game, thinking that he was just a reserved sort of man, much like Sage could be. It wasn't until the confession at dinner that he'd realized just how wrong that perception was. There had been so much pain in those simple answers. Oh, Aya hid it well. Cye doubted that most could have seen it but the Ronin of Trust had a few advantages.
One thing he was now convinced of was that the young men in that alley were not simple killers. Cye believed the flatly spoken facts of their targets' crimes. It had actually made him feel better; he couldn't believe that he would be so drawn to the redhead if the other boy had been truly evil. But it didn't help that Aya had drawn his pain so tightly inward that it would take very little for him to snap.
Cye sighed in gentle exasperation as he got to his feet. It seemed now that he had two goals: one, to get home, and the other, to try and heal the shattered pieces of the quiet swordsman. It would probably be a fight every step of the way but it couldn't be helped. He was known for being the mother hen because his nature would not allow him to leave anything to suffer. And, he admitted in his own moment of honesty, he wanted to see what was under that facade. He wanted to see life and fire and passion in him and maybe claim a little of it for himself.
[ on to chapter 3 ]