Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Entry #1          Sunglass-Tint Rose

The colour of waxing poetic.

The colour of firsts, the colour of quartz.

The colour of wind-chapped lips, watered-down wine, worn insides of seashells.

The color of Himalayan salt, the colour of giggles.

The colour of all things new.

---

“Please look into the camera and state your name.”

“It’s on the passport, isn’t it?”

“Say it out loud, please. It’s part of the identity verification process. The recording taken here will be matched with the recording taken at your port of departure.”

“Does that even work?”

“Look, kid, I’m just trying to do my job, alright? It’s bad enough I’m stuck with this transfer; I don’t need you mouthing off to me in the middle of Char Hour just because you woke up on the wrong side of the space shuttle. Now look in the lens, and say your full name.”

Well, that was an outburst and a half. No wonder nobody ever came here.

“Ugh, fine. Aslan Jade Glenreed.”

The airport official glared at him from inside his glass cubicle, a sour smile on his face. “There, was that so hard?”

Ash scowled and fanned himself with his hand. No coat, no cardigan, not even a pseudo-hoodie on and he was still far too hot. Hell, he was going to cook in his t-shirt at this rate. The official had called it Char Hour, but Ash could swear the sweat was boiling off him the second it beaded on his skin.

“And what is the purpose of your visit to the Pale Blue Dot?”

Ash snorted. God rest Sagan’s soul and the dignity of the pretty imagery he’d coined. It only ever came up in derogatory contexts now. “And here I thought we were supposed to use government names.”

The official looked at him like he’d demanded both of his kidneys. “Atlantis, born and raised,” he said gruffly, pointing one finger at himself. “It’s what my government called it. Now answer the question.”

Atlantis, huh. His life there felt like ancient history, even though it hadn’t been more than five years ago. Ash remembered the year he’d spent there, remembered the endless stretches of gleaming steel and rivets, remembered the coffin of a room he and Michael had shared, remembered looking out of their little circle of a window at the Orion nebula, threading pink and purple and orange through the obscurity of space, ornamented with stars like pinpricks of halogen lights.

Same as last year. Same as the year before. Same as it’d been for as long as he could remember.

Ash had lived in five different space colonies over the course of his very short life, and yet they had all been the same.

Grey room, utilitarian architecture, just enough space to breathe. One tiny glimpse of an ink-black sky that pulled off a miracle once in a while. Big whoop.

This airport wasn’t like that, though.

There was grime here, grime and tile and brick to undercut all the metal and glass. The air was not comfortable here, not rigidly temperature-regulated and crisp like paper cuts on his skin. No, it was muggy and clingy and erratic, bursts of breeze propagating hope through the sparse groups of passengers milling around the terminal. And the light, it didn’t come from the ceilings here, stable and starch-white; hell, if anything, it seemed like the makers hadn’t bothered with light fixtures here at all. No, instead the light streamed in through the windows, butter doused with gold, and Ash saw more shadows in the ten minutes he’d been here than he’d ever seen in his life.

Including that of the airport official, who was staring him down most expectantly.

Oh right, he was meant to be answering a question.

“My dad was contracted to work here; research for updating textbooks,” Ash said evenly, not deviating a word from what he and Michael had practiced together. “I’m here with my family.”

The official nodded, and tapped away at his computer. “And what company is your father contracted with?”

“Stella Lane Publishing.” The lie was easy off his tongue. Ash had been lying to port-of-entry officials ever since they’d deemed him old enough to speak without Max and Jess’ supervision. Though, he confessed, he was not quite as good as Jess yet. She sold it better than he did, sugar sweet and disarming as she could be if she wanted to. Lucky for all of them, she didn’t want to all that often.

The official ruffled through his documents one more time, then gathered them up and passed them back through the hole in the glass. Ash heard the ding of the barrier opening up to the other side of immigration check, where the baggage claim conveyor belts whirred loudly.

“Welcome to Earth, kid. May the universe have mercy on your soul.”

Only when he was on the other side of the barrier did Ash flip the guy off.

“Get away from there already!” Jessica hissed at him, tossing him his duffel bag as he approached. She was standing by herself in a cluster of their luggage, dabbing at her forehead with one of her sleeves. They only had one bag each, never really staying in one place long enough to accumulate enough stuff to have more, but bunched together like this at Jess’ feet…it really did look like they’d brought their entire lives with them.

“Can’t go two seconds without sassing someone, can you?” Jess scolded as he went to lean on the wall behind her. “What if the jackass hadn’t let you past the barrier?”

Ash ignored the question, reaching for the water bottle in her other hand instead even as Max returned from the restroom, Michael skipping along beside him.

“What can I say? Your worse half’s negligible respect for authority is rubbing off on me,” he said loudly, smirking in Max’s direction.

Max grinned irritatingly in response, even as Michael let go of his hand and tottered around them in circles, still a little woozy from the re-entry shuttle ride. “Teenager and toddler, we’re really in the sweet spot now, aren’t we, Jess?”

Jessica chuckled drily. “You’re telling me.” She pulled her hair into a bun and hefted both her and Michael’s bags. “Is Shunichi here, yet?”

Max scrolled through his messages on his U-Watch, trying his level best to press the right parts on the tiny touchscreen. Ordinarily, he would’ve put the thing into hologram mode so that he could see better, but for all his bumbling Max was a smart man. He knew better than to throw up his contact screen for everyone to see, even if it was no larger than an over-sized index card. “He’s right outside. Blue car with the smashed taillight.”

“Okay. Let’s get going. Ash, hold onto your brother, would you?”

Ash turned his gaze to Michael then, who had started to wander just a little too far. “Hey, Mikey! C’mere, we gotta get going now.”

He held out his hand as Michael bounded over, and a few minutes later, they were all walking towards the exit, Michael holding onto two of Ash’s fingers with one tiny fist.

“So, how the fuck did this guy get a car?” Ash asked as they went. “Aren’t they like, insanely rare out here?”

“Language!” Jess snapped, gesturing to Michael even as a twinkle flashed in the little kid’s eyes. Ash fought to keep his smile behind his teeth. Oh God, he was definitely going to repeat the word later.

Jess would have his hide for sure, but at least they’d both get a laugh out of it.

Max threw up his hands theatrically. “Ah, the perks of working for elitist Elysium jerks who commission thirty-year long projects just for authentic art that captures the, quote, raw, ugly, glory of Earth through the ages.”

“Talk about a jackpot,” Jessica added on wryly. “How else do you think he pays that protégé of his?”

Yeesh. Ash had heard of this kind of thing; how could he not have, living with two of the most devil-may-care journalists the space colonies had ever seen. It seemed like a day didn’t go by without some tone-deaf-at-best-and-deranged-at-worst action of the rich and powerful being debated at the dinner table. Ash had always known that folk like that had their snake-fangs dug firmly into the governance and economy of the space colonies, but he hadn’t expected them to care about the planet that majority of humanity had abandoned a hundred and four years ago, when it became clear that it could no longer support relentless leeching.

Then again, maybe it made sense after all, to have images of Earth. To remind the people of the space colonies that things could be a whole lot worse for them, if they didn’t behave themselves. To force them to choose the lesser of two evils.

Frying pan or fire. Colonies or Earth. No good options, that everybody could agree on, but which one was less bad, was more up for debate, a debate that flared up during every election season these days.

Ash shuddered. Highly paid to produce art that would almost certainly be made into propaganda. He wasn’t so sure that Shunichi had hit the jackpot. But more than that…

“Isn’t doing something like this against both your moral compasses or something, though?” Ash pointed out.

Max’s smile screamed ‘oh-you-sweet-summer-child’ at him, and Ash frowned instinctively. “Corrupt systems and oppressive egomaniacs are against our moral compasses, kid. Taking advantage of them, not so much. Plus,” He paused for a moment, his expression growing grave, “it’s not exactly a picnic living here. We wouldn’t even be here if it wasn’t for—”

“Your over-confident dumbassery back at Elysium?” Jessica snickered.

Ash stifled a giggle, and Max turned his wounded face away from them both. “Either way,” he went on, “the point is that no one comes here unless they have to, or unless they get offered half the world in exchange.”

“Or they’re chasing down decade-old conspiracies,” Ash said under his breath, something well-worn and leaden in his chest. Max and Jess could disguise it however they liked, but he knew. He’d always know.

Why they always bounced from colony to colony. Why Max was so relentless in the pursuit of his stories. Why they were really here.

It had a name, this reason, seven letters long and as wide as Ash’s baby years, trapped in an iridescent bubble between them all; between him and Max and Jessica.

But Ash didn’t want to pop it, not now at least. He wasn’t ready yet. He wasn’t brave enough to yet.

“Okay. Didn’t know a car was the same as half the fucking world, but okay.”

Jessica narrowed her eyes at him. “Ash, I swear, one more f-bomb in front of Michael and we’re leaving you outside to roast.”

“I thought it was more along the lines of charring, no?”

“You really wanna try me after a five-day flight, young man?”

Ash stuck his tongue out at her, but said nothing, choosing instead to focus on the incredible rectangle of diluted lemon light in front of them. One push on those glass doors, and Earth would open up in front of them.

Ash couldn’t deny the little tendril of anticipation that curled in his stomach.

Max was the first to push through, Jess by his side, and then suddenly it was Ash’s turn.

The first thing that hit him was the burn.

Stinging, torching, fucking relentless. Coming from all sides, coming for every inch of exposed skin. Sparking ignition disguised in amber, light that was more punishing than darkness.

Ash’s eyes screwed shut, one hand going to shade his face while the other held onto Michael as he squeaked in distress and pressed his face into Ash’s pant leg. He heard Max and Jess cry out too, and stop abruptly in their tracks as they struggled to see where they were going past the outpouring of brightness from the sky.

Huh. So, this was what sunlight was like. Ash was not impressed so far.

“Max, Je—Shit, sorry, sorry! This way, this way!”

The frantic voice barrelled towards them on swift feet, and before he knew it, Ash found himself being hassled a few steps to his right, stumbling on the uneven ground as his ears strained to track the movements of Jess’ rolling suitcase over the voice’s profuse apologies. There was a click and a door disengaged, and one gentle push on his shoulder later, Ash was falling gratefully into the backseat of a car, Michael on his lap.

The light wasn’t quite so omnipresent here, but the seats themselves were like the surface of a recently unplugged iron, and Ash squirmed in an effort to sit on any piece of cushion that wouldn’t congeal his jeans to his ass. Jess tumbled in next to him, drawing the blinds over the car windows in her haste to quell the all-consuming light. Up front, Max jumped into the passenger seat and Ash finally heaved a sigh of relief as more blinds were pulled down and a soft sepia glow settled over the inside of the car.

Only then did he allow himself to fully open his eyes, to catch a glimpse of Earth through the uncovered driver’s portion of the windshield.

Holy shit.

There was so much…so much.

Unblemished sky as blue as the hottest fires. Concrete and wood and rusting scaffolding, propping up buildings frozen mid-crumble. Unruly weeds breaking apart expanses of charcoal with flash-bangs of green, wildflowers like confetti trampled into the potholes on the road. Bicycles chained to broken streetlights like fugitives, dust swirling in the sunbeams in a coordinated dance.

Unkempt, unbridled, unwilling to be crushed into nothing.

The aftermath of the energy wars, of the floods and the hurricanes. Part II of a story that had been written off as over by all the people who’d made the textbooks Ash had read. Not the stuff of dreams for sure, but railing against being a nightmare with a fierce sort of dignity.

Distortion. Saturation. Colour.

Ash was transfixed, inching to the edge of his seat and peering curiously around the driver’s seat in front of him until all that filled his vision was an unpopulated road and a lone knobbly tree whose leaves sang in the freak breeze.

That was until Shunichi finished loading their luggage into the boot of the car and plopped down in the driver’s seat, of course.

Ash jolted back against his seat as the man sat down, panting softly and adjusting the sunglasses on his face.

“Sorry about that,” Shunichi said awkwardly, as he put the car into drive. “I should’ve thought to bring you guys sunglasses. It gets really bright here around one o’clock in the afternoon. They call it Char Hour.”

Ash grumbled under his breath. So he’d heard. He reached automatically for the seat belt as the car started up, but was startled to find nothing there. There was a moment of panic; Ash had literally never been in a vehicle without getting strapped in somehow, but as soon as the car started to move, he realized why a belt would’ve only been a waste of resources.

The potholes on this stretch of the road made it so that they weren’t going faster than a very motivated cyclist. Hell, Ash counted three cyclists that passed them, swerving around the crude dips in the road like it was a game.

“How was your flight?” Shunichi asked, as they left the airport and the outskirts of the northern part of the settlement behind them.

“Oh, you know, like the inside of a malfunctioning ice box devoid of leg room and fresh food,” Ash quipped like a slingshot, cracking the blinds a little so that Michael could peer out. “Pinnacle of luxury.”

He saw Shunichi raise an eyebrow in the rear-view mirror, saw the softness of well-intentioned features morph into knowing mirth.

“Ash,” Max said dismissively when Shunichi shot him a questioning glance, as if that was explanation enough for the comment. “He’s got such a way with words.”

“He’s almost as bad as you,” Shunichi said, rolling his eyes. Ash didn’t know who that comment was directed towards, Max or Jessica. He supposed it didn’t matter.

Brash like Max. Sharp like Jess. Tenacious like Max. Protective like Jess.

He hoped he was as bad as them. Just as much as he hoped he was as good as them.

Then at least he’d truly be a part of their family.

“He’s better than either of us,” Jess asserted, catching his Ash’s flickering eyes with an unshakeable glance before looking back at Shunichi. “He’d land one of those fancy government scholarships if Max,” she kicked his seat emphatically, “specialized in petty scandal and puff pieces instead of political commentary.”

Max turned around in his seat, feigning mortification. “Damn, it’s almost like you married a man of integrity, Jess!”

“Fuck off!”

Ash smiled a cat’s smug smile. “Language,” he reminded.

Jessica glared daggers at him, and Michael high-fived him in silent support. But for all the playful bickering in the backseat, the atmosphere in the front of the car grew quickly grew grim.

“Speaking of the job,” Max began, unclasping his U-Watch and gesturing to the rest of them to do the same, “did you manage to get—”

“Oh yes! They’re in there,” Shunichi said, nodding towards the glove compartment as he turned off the wider road and into a more meandering lane.

“Why does Dad want my watch?” Michael whispered to Ash as he helped him take his off and hand it forward to Max, along with his own and Jessica’s.

“It’s not safe to have here, bud. The bad guys will find us if we don’t get rid of it,” Ash said quietly, tousling his hair even as Max drew out a manilla envelope from the glove compartment and slid out three brick-like phones, staring with some disbelief at the chunky buttons and tiny screens.

“But my shows,” Michael whined. “JoJo the Friendly Space Drifter is on my watch. Also, all my picture books—”

“I know,” Ash soothed, staring wistfully at his own watch as his carefully curated musings on hydrogen-powered engines and unique asteroids were stuffed unceremoniously into the manilla envelope. “We’ll just have to find something new here, okay, bud?”

Michael accepted the platitude with a pout and continued to stare out of the window, taking in the stretches of asphalt punctuated with debris as Max continued to talk.

“Are you kidding me, with these?” he said, holding up the relic of a communication device to Shunichi’s face.

“These, are all that survived,” Shunichi countered sternly. “Take them or leave them.”

Max let out an exasperated groan, but passed out the phones nonetheless: one for himself, one for Jess, and one for Ash. If Michael was miffed not to have his own, he didn’t show it, too captivated with the sliver of bottle-green tangle that had now started to creep into the skyline.

“What’ll you do with the watches? Any way to bounce the tracker signal and sell them?” Jess enquired.

Shunichi considered the notion for a second, before shaking his head. “Above my pay grade. I’ll run them by Nadia’s place; her boyfriend will probably know what to do. He’s the one who got me the phones.”

Nadia. That was another name that Ash had always heard in passing, like Shunichi’s, but had never had a face for.

“Huh. Didn’t know she was into bad boys,” Jess remarked, half-smile on.

“She isn’t,” Shunichi clarified with a chuckle. “He’s a cop. Or at least, whatever passes for a cop here.”

“Working with a cop,” Max sighed tiredly. “Guess there’s a first time for everything.”

Ash couldn’t help but laugh at that, sinking into the seat as the car’s reedy air conditioning finally got the interiors to a bearable temperature. They drove for a long time, so much so that the airport became a speck on the horizon by the time the car stopped. They pulled up to a curb in a neighbourhood that shimmered with sleepy voices, trickling through the cracks in the craggy buildings. The lane they were parked in was just about wide enough for another car, though one wasn’t to be seen for miles around, and a rusty gate acted as a welcome mat on the driveway in front of a building to their right.

“Here we are,” Shunichi said, pointing at the structure. “Home sweet home.”

Ash dared to raise the blind a little more, the sunlight not quite as strong now that Char Hour was behind them. It was a fifteen-storey construction, but from the looks of the steel pipes spilling out of the concrete, the support skeleton girthing it and the rampant ivy smothering the façade, Ash guessed only the first ten floors were actually liveable. It looked unfinished and battered, brand new and hopelessly old all at once.

“Well, it’s certainly different,” Jessica said, sizing the building up like it would strike out and attack them. Max seemed equally apprehensive, and Michael just looked on with wide-eyed fascination. But Ash, Ash didn’t quite share any of their sentiments.

Nothing about the building was symmetrical, nothing was efficient, nothing was pristine. It was all barely-held-together, scraped into one, messy.

Was it bizarre then for Ash to be drawn to it? To be drawn not to the discomfort it represented, but the challenge?

“I’ll go on ahead to Chang Dai; see Nadia,” Shunichi said. “Ei-chan will take you from here.”

“Ei-chan?” Max asked.

“Eiji, my assistant. He lives on the ninth floor here. He is around your age, I think, Ash,” Shunichi said, addressing Ash through the rear-view mirror before his eyes moved to look for his mentee. “Where is he, I told him to be here at two-thirty…”

Shunichi gave two short blasts of the car horn, then stuck his head out of the car window. “Ei-chan?!”

Two monumental minutes of silence.

Then the deafening tinkling of a bicycle bell. A voice like wishes in a bottle, like one-in-a-million odds and folklore mischief.

“Sorry, sorry! I’m here! I’m here, Ibe-san!”

A symphony of metal stalling behind the car. The halting of breeze like a bated breath. Footsteps, footsteps like feathers on a cloud.

Then, all at once, a pale sunhat pulled over rumpled dark hair and a burnished-bright face pushing into the car through Shunichi’s rolled-down window.

“Hello! I’m Okumura Eiji!”

Ash’s first thought was that his eyes looked like space romanticized.

Like the galaxies artists had imagined before the first space colonies stripped them of their mystery. Like young magic flowering out of the void. Like the gateway to the unexplored, to everything that the universe had to offer.

Possibility. Inviting expanse. And unabashed naïveté.

Ash got the feeling that these eyes saw a beautiful world, at any and all costs. He got the feeling that they made cracks into branches and shattered ideals into mosaics and filth and mould into the spawn of stardust.

Lethally optimistic. Seeing and unseeing all at once. Ash couldn’t decide if it irked him or not.

“Sorry to keep you waiting,” Eiji said sheepishly. His hands had been clasped behind him all this time, but he brought them forward now, to show them what they held. “I went to pick up some sunglasses for you all!”

“Where’d you get these?” Shunichi marvelled, even as Eiji passed a pair of navy round-frame glasses to Max. Ash smacked a palm on his forehead as the man promptly handed them off to Jess, and gestured none-too-subtly at the gaudy orange sports glasses Eiji held instead.

Yeesh, how had this utter child managed to raise him?

The beginnings of a giggle bubbled up to Eiji’s lips at the action, but he had the decorum to calmly answer Shunichi’s question instead. “Shorter gave them to me. He picked up a whole bunch of spares the last time the F4A came round.”

“Shorter as in Shorter Wong? Nadia’s scamp of a baby brother?” Jess asked, tender recognition flashing in her eyes.

Eiji grinned. “Yes, ma’am! He’s in my year at school.”

“God, I haven’t seen him since Nadia sent us those baby pictures, what fifteen years ago?”

“Seventeen,” Max corrected.

Jess kicked his seat again, indignation a mesh-mask over the nostalgia in her eyes. Ash wondered what it was about that time that glazed them so. “He must be all grown up now.”

Jessica sat for a few moments in the wake of that sentiment, while Ash stewed in the mathematics of it all.

Seventeen years ago…That made this Shorter character older than him. Which consequently made Eiji older than him too.

Huh. It seemed experience didn’t pool in Eiji’s eyes, choosing instead to dimple his cheeks.

“Oooh, can I have the purple ones with the sparkles, please?” Michael chimed in then, clambering over Ash’s legs in excitement as the latter rolled down the back-seat window far enough for Eiji to put his hand through.

“Of course!” Eiji said sweetly, even as Ash hissed in pain, what with Michael’s folded knees digging into his thighs. “I brought these ones special for you.”

It wasn’t even a lie. The purple ones were significantly smaller than the others Eiji had, obviously made for a child what with the glitter and cartoon cloud detailing.

Thoughtful.

Michael took them from his hand and tried them on with great gusto, amazed at how the world was washed purple the moment the glasses sat upon the bridge of his nose.

“Ash! Ash, your hair!” he chirped, grabbing a stray lock that fell over Ash’s face. “It looks all pinky-orange!”

Ash laughed, gently disentangling his fingers before he yanked the chunk out. “I’m glad you like the glasses, buddy. What do we say, now?”

“Oh, yes!” Michael said, turning back to Eiji, who was watching with an endeared smile. “Thank you, Eiji!”

“You’re very welcome!” Eiji said, pulling his cheek affectionately. “I guess that means that these are—” Eiji’s eyes moved with the last pair of sunglasses in his hand, and his gaze snagged on Ash’s as he held them out.

A wisp of a gasp escaped Eiji’s parted lips, and his eyes stopped mid-blink to widen.

“—these are for you. Ash.”

There was raw honey in his voice, and for a moment those eyes of his seemed to a birth a star. Then he was turning away abruptly, thrusting the sunglasses into Ash’s hands and holding the car door open for him instead.

“Welcome to the Wolfsbane Settlement!”

Michael jumped off his lap and out of the car eagerly, Max and Jess following suit, but it took a whole minute for the stun to release Ash’s legs. Eiji went off to help unload the luggage from the boot, but he just sat there, blinking like a fish at the glasses that had been placed his lax palm.

Rose-tinted Aviators.

There was a caustic joke in here somewhere, but for once, Ash was not in the mood.

He was in the mood for distortion. For saturation. For colour.

For everything that space utterly lacked.

So, he put on the sunglasses, and got out of the car.

---

“Your apartment is on the sixth floor,” Eiji informed, carrying his bicycle by the frame as easily as a tote bag. He let them into the building using a jangle of keys, talking as he led them through the unlit concrete corridors. “The elevator doesn’t work, I’m afraid; not enough electricity for it, but the stairs are good exercise!”

He climbed up them steadily, barely breaking a sweat. Meanwhile Ash huffed and puffed behind him, weighed down by both Michael and his duffel bag. Max and Jess weren’t fairing much better, though that was mostly the fault of the suitcases they had to haul.

The rest of the blame of course, rested with gravity itself, a lot stronger here than its simulated version on the space colonies. Ash had never dragged his feet in his life, accustomed to gliding and cushioned jumping, but here on these stairs, he felt his limbs pull tighter than elastic as he struggled to keep pace with Eiji.

He was strong. He didn’t look it; his shirt cascaded off his shoulders and his pants did not hug his legs, but Ash got the sense that there were well-worked muscles underneath, built not for vanity but utility; that under the waterfall of Eiji’s clothes there was a chiselled cliff-face of a physique.

It was only a simple observation. Nothing more. It wasn’t like Ash was…looking at him.

He averted his eyes hurriedly when Eiji turned around to see if they were alright, muttering something inflammatory to Max about how he was sixty-two at thirty-one. That was enough observing for one day.

Theirs was the only habitable apartment on their floor; according to Eiji the other two were too fallen-in to be set up with power lines no matter what anyone tried to do.

“Your place is fully functional, though,” he assured, unlocking the door with a quick flick of his wrist and letting them in. “I made sure to check all appliances.”

A gust of stifling wind greeted them as they walked in, carrying with it pale dust and shrivelled ivy leaves. Ash pinpointed their source as the living room window, less a window and more a square hole in the right-most wall, held half-closed by a meshed tarp. The area was spacious, but there wasn’t much by way of furniture: a couch with patchwork skin, a low shelf-frame repurposed as a coffee table, two doorless wardrobes worn with scratches. Everything was pointed at the window; there were no screens here. No holo-projectors, no computers, not even a TV. Just a lone radio on the kitchen island, next to a covered baking tray.

“I made brownies, as a welcome present,” Eiji said diffidently, as Michael leapt up on one of the two stools next to the island to inspect the inside of the tray. “There are also some groceries in the fridge. I wasn’t sure what you’d like, but the basics are all there.”

“Where did you get the chocolate for these?” Max asked, looking upon the brownies with innocent wonder. “It’s super rare in the colonies, and it’s not exactly commercial here, is it?”

“No, it is not.” Eiji’s eyes grew veiled. “But I need cocoa powder for my work with Ibe-san, so I grow my own cacao tree. It’d be a waste if I didn’t make any chocolate.”

Ash’s eyebrows shot up into his hair and he scoffed. “Sounds shady as hell.”

He’d expected Eiji to be offended, but that wasn’t the case at all. No, if anything, Eiji’s smile was mock-wicked. Ash’s eyes followed him as he sashayed past him and into the interiors of the house, totally unperturbed. “Even if it is, who’s going to tell on me? You?”

Ash pursed his lips and cleared his throat. He might, he really might just tell; Eiji didn’t know for sure that he wouldn’t. He might do it just to razz Eiji, he might do it because he didn’t exactly leave the reckless, impulsive part of him back in space.

Yes, he really might tell, if the syrupy, plumy lilt of Eiji’s voice didn’t make it so goddamn hard to speak.

Jess huffed a laugh as she attempted to work the electric stove, Max patted his shoulder consolingly before sticking his burning face into the open fridge, and Ash was finally brought back into the present moment. He trailed after Michael’s skipping form then, as he explored the two bedrooms that lay beyond the living room.

“This is your room,” Eiji said, opening up the door for both of them. It was an L-shaped space, with one twin bed pushed up against the window and the other set up against the wall perpendicular to it. The only other things in the room were an assortment of mismatched dressers and one very blue trunk to hold their stuff, and yet it burst with more life than anything Ash had had in space.

Evidently, Michael felt the same way, because the second he set foot in the room, he squealed. “I call dibs on the window bed!” he announced, jumping up on it and fumbling with the ties that held the meshed tarp covering the window in place.

“No shoes on the covers,” Ash admonished softly, tapping on his ankles before kicking his own duffel bag under the bed by the wall, and plonking down exhaustedly onto it.

“Do you like it?” Eiji asked, watching him from where he leaned against the doorframe.

Ash straightened up, turning his face to the breeze as Michael managed to peel one rectangular half of the tarp away from the window. “Mhm. It’s roomy.”

“As rooms tend to be.”

Ash rolled his eyes, a smile straining against his stubborn lips. “You know what I meant.”

“Yes, well, just between the two of us, this one’s actually the master bedroom,” Eiji said with a wink. “I figured you guys needed the bigger room more than your parents. I used to share with my kid sister too, and let me tell you, it was not a good time sharing that tiny second bedroom.”

Ash grinned at him. Exasperation was an interesting expression on Eiji’s face, diffusing the glimmer in his eyes and bringing out the angles of his cheekbones in a way that actually made him look his age.

“Do you still—”

“Eiji! Eiji, what is that?”

Both boys turned to look at Michael then, as he peered out of the window intently. Ash hadn’t considered before just what kind of view he would have from the sixth floor, but now that he was seeing it, he couldn’t help but be drawn towards it.

The entire sprawl of the settlement stretched out in front of them, sagging buildings and unfinished grey-black facades rising and falling with the rocky terrain, winding dirt roads splitting up the landscape in ribbons of sand and copper.

Countless mutations of dull under a blazing blue sky. Truly Earth was hopeless contradiction, in every sense of the words.

But Michael wasn’t quite referring to that, no, he seemed interested in something more specific, silhouetted against the horizon.

“That,” Eiji said, following the direction in which Michael’s finger was pointing, “is the Wolfsbane Nuclear Power Plant. It makes electricity for the whole settlement.”

Ash eyed the two cooling towers breaking into the sky uneasily; for some reason these were more unnerving than the reactors he knew powered the space colonies. At least up there, they weren’t shoved in his face, and he didn’t have to confront the range of their destructive power.

“What about that?” he asked, gesturing to the swathe of dense verdure that spread out from around the dreaded building like a carpet.

“Those are the Wolfsbane Woodlands. It’s a bit of a misleading name; most parts of it are farmlands, but there are some pockets where the animals live.”

“Animals?” Michael repeated excitedly. “What kinds of animals?”

“Monkeys and jungle cats, mostly, but sometimes snakes and frogs wander onto the farms too,” Eiji said.

“I’m surprised there aren’t any wolves,” Ash remarked. “what with the settlement being named after them.”

Something solemn and heavy came over Eiji then. “Ah, it’s not named Wolf’s Bane,” he said quietly, pausing between the two syllables to separate them. “It’s named Wolfsbane, like the poisonous flower. All Earth settlements are named after them. Belladonna, Euphorbia, Hemlock, Foxglove. And those are just the major ones.”

“That’s fucking morbid,” Ash exclaimed, genuinely taken aback. “Who signed off on that decision?”

“No one on Earth,” Eiji said, a mirthless laugh escaping his lips as he pointed up at the sky. Ash wondered when that gesture had stopped meaning God, had stopped meaning heaven, and started meaning space colony puppet-masters. “Apparently, they think that the names suit the settlements; that all things come here to die.”

Eiji’s eyes flitted down to his own feet, and he scuffed the toes of his running shoes against the floor. “I’d be angry, if—if it’d do anything. If it’d change anything.”

Ash opened his mouth to say something reassuring, even though the words clung clumsily to the sides of his throat. But Eiji just looked up at him and broke into a smile once more.

“But it doesn’t, so I’m not!”

He was looking at Ash that way again, like there was something in his face, in his eyes. Something new, something important. Ash couldn’t figure out what it was for the life of him, but he was content to smile back.

Eiji’s smiles were infectious. Just a little bit. Just a tiny bit.

“So, do you know what concentration you’re picking for the new school year yet?” Eiji inquired, clearly wanting to change the subject. “It’s starting next Monday.”

Ash blinked at him stupidly. “Do I know my what for the what, now?”

“Your concentration for the new school year.”

Jessica’s voice came to them from behind, and Ash turned his confused gaze onto her as she walked into the room.

“He doesn’t know yet, Eiji,” she answered for him. “But I’m sure you can help him; maybe show him around the Academy?”

Eiji’s face lit up, and he smiled at Ash kindly. “Of course!”

Ash’s jaw was still gaping when Jess thanked him. “Speaking of help though, any chance you can show Max how to work the shower? He’s been struggling in the bathroom for the past ten minutes.”

“Sure!” Eiji gave Ash one last half-wave and went off to the room across the hall.

“Why don’t you go with him, sweetie?” Jess said to Michael, pulling him away from the window and re-securing the tarp. “If you’re going to climb all over the bed, the least you can do is wash up first.”

Michael slid off the bed sulkily, not ready to go. Ash could tell he liked sitting by the window, liked feeling the hiccupping wind on his skin. “Only if I can have Eiji’s brownies after,” he negotiated.

“You can have one, and that’s only if you finish your lunch.”

“Boo.”

“Boo, indeed. Now go take your shower before I finish all the brownies myself.”

Michael groaned, but left the room nonetheless, calling after Max. That just left Ash and Jessica, perched on the edge of Michael’s bed. The questions hung like lead between them, more than they usually did, so Ash spoke first.

“What’s this about a new school year?”

Jess sighed, concern tempering her blue-steel eyes. “I had a chat with Max, and we both think it’d do you good to enrol at the Academy here. Maybe meet some people your own age.”

Ash shook his head. He’d never been to school in his life; there was no such thing in the space colonies. Most people learnt over their holo-screens and U-Watches in the sanctuary of their own rooms, and even then, it was only things that they were interested in. There was no mandated curriculum, no standardized testing; only certification tests once every five years.

And now, what, he was suddenly supposed to adjust to some academy?

In all honesty, Ash didn’t think he could do it.

“What’s the point?” he said glumly. “We’ll probably be out of here before the year is out anyway.”

Jessica winced a little, and maybe Ash shouldn’t have felt the little blip of satisfaction at that. He knew it wasn’t exactly Jess’ fault, all this constant relocating, but still. She was his guardian. She had to know how much he hated it, how much it bothered him to not have a definitive home.

“It’s not like that this time, kiddo,” she said softly. “Golzine’s guys know you’re alive now. And after Max’s little stunt in Elysium, they’ve probably doubled their efforts to look for us. We’re in hiding now, not exile like usual. There’s no telling how long we’ll be here.”

Ash muffled a whine into his hands.

Golzine. God, that name grated on his bones like nails on a chalkboard. It had only ever been a name to Ash, but it always stirred this nausea within him; he always recoiled from it and the list of atrocities attached to it. “Is it always going to be like this? Is this all my life is going to be?”

Jessica wrapped an arm around him, and Ash rested his head on her shoulder forlornly. “I hope not, sweetie,” she whispered. “I hope we finish it once and for all, here. But in the meantime, we’ve got to keep up appearances, blend in. And for you, that means school. You can do that, can’t you?”

“Fine. Yes. Okay,” Ash grumbled, crossing his arms like an irate toddler. Something he’d picked up from Michael. “I’d just like the record to reflect that I think this sucks.”

Jess swatted his shoulder playfully. “I don’t get you! You spend your whole life wishing you could break out of a metal tube and explore, and now that you have the chance, you want to sit in the house?”

“School is not exploring!”

“You don’t know what school is, Ash. And you won’t be there all day,” Jess said, glare bleeding into her voice now. “You’ll make friends; explore with them.”

What fucking friends? Nobody would want to be friends with me.

The retort was right there, on the tip of Ash’s tongue. But it stayed behind his teeth.

Because Eiji’s smiles were just as memorable as they were infectious, and Ash closed his eyes as the memory of them warped the retort into something that bloomed delicately in his chest.

I’d like to be friends with Eiji. Maybe he’d like to be friends with me.

---

Jess had stipulated that Eiji’s brownies would last them at least four days.

To absolutely no one’s surprise, they disappeared by dinner time the next day.

Ash was tasked with returning the now-empty tray to Eiji, Max teasing him to no end about how he should put his ‘youthful’ energy to good use by climbing up all those infernal stairs to the ninth floor. Ash had stuck his tongue out at him and complained, but trudged his way up to Eiji’s house nevertheless, even as the light in the sky continued to wane.

As he knocked on Eiji’s door, he noticed that it was different to their own, burgundy instead of the standard chestnut brown. Just as he was pondering how Eiji had managed that, the door opened with a flourish.

“Ash!” Eiji greeted pleasantly. “Hello!”

“Hi,” Ash said, looking him up and down. He looked different now to the way he had the day before, clad in a weather-beaten t-shirt and fleece pyjama bottoms that featured ducks, half his body hidden behind a fraying smoke-grey apron splotched with technicolour.

Soft, sort of ethereal, like a fever-dream prince. No plot loyalty; no rhyme or reason to him. Just there because his presence seemed to make the world brighter for a split-second.

Ash cringed internally. Okay, that really was enough…observing.

“I brought your, uh, your tray back. We finished all your brownies. Super delicious.”

“Thank you! I’m glad you liked them,” Eiji said airily, sweeping his bangs out of his eyes. He accepted the tray from Ash’s hands, but did not bid him goodbye. Ash himself shuffled in place, too curious about the mismatched gloves on Eiji’s hands and the obnoxious sound of water bubbling behind him to just turn on his heel and walk away.

“So, what are you doing?” Ash asked, attempting to see around him.

“Oh, just some stuff for work,” Eiji began, looking behind him as if to check on something. “Do you want to see?”

Ash nodded, and Eiji glowed like the edge of an eclipse, holding the door open for him so he could come in.

“I have mint tea; do you want some?” Eiji offered, holding up the half-empty mug that sat on his kitchen island as Ash strode in, gawking at the apartment. He hummed back in acknowledgement, too overwhelmed with what he was seeing to bring any words to his lips.

God, if he’d thought before that the ivy crawling all over this building was overgrown, then the sheer wealth of plants in Eiji’s house were the very definition of wild.

Not wild like chaos, or wild like dishevelment, but wild like…freedom.

There were all kinds: fruits and vegetables and flowers, and they grew in whichever direction they wanted. Towards the gigantic floor-to-ceiling window, into the shade cast by his bookcases-turned-multipurpose storage units, even crashing onto the floor if they wished, their pretty corpses lining the bases of the pots like doilies. The countless leaves bobbed in the growing breeze like shy dancers, and as Ash drew in a deep breath, a million different scents swirled into one big sucker-punch to the lungs that knocked the goofiest of smiles out of him.

“Wow.”

It felt silly to only say so much in the face of all that, but Eiji took it as the warm compliment that Ash had meant it as, beaming at him as he brought him a cup of hot mint tea.

“One of the few upsides of being a dye-maker for a famous artist,” Eiji said by way of explanation. “You get to live inside a perfumed forest diorama.”

“Seriously,” Ash agreed, taking the cup from him and idly running his fingers through a bunch of hibiscus blooms. “Your place makes the Woodlands look like a desert.”

“I only grow what I need,” Eiji said modestly. “It all depends on what colours Ibe-san wants for his paintings.”

“Yeah? What colours does he want now?”

“Warm colours. Sunset colours.” Eiji nodded towards the view outside his window. Ash realized only then that it was gaping open, the tarp rolled up neatly above it. He looked out now to the blushing sky, mottled with champagne and candlelight as the red sun sank lower and lower on the horizon.

“I’ve never—we don’t…we don’t get these in space,” Ash stammered, damn near holding his breath out of respect for what was unfolding before him. “Everything is so…so monochrome up there. I’ve never seen anything that red before.”

“Oh, if you think that’s red, wait till you see this,” Eiji said, beckoning to him as he returned to the stove in the open kitchen. Ash went to stand to next to him, to peer inside the gigantic bubbling pots that sat side by side on the burners.

There were flower petals inside, rapidly haemorrhaging colour into the water they floated in, water that now bore the tint of cherry-skins and wine. It was a red so intense it looked almost black in the sparse light.

“It’s not quite there yet, but once it’s ready to go on canvas, it will be dusty pink,” Eiji said proudly. “Ibe-san uses it as a wash for sunrise and sunset landscapes.”

“What’s it made of?” Ash asked curiously. “Smells nice.”

“Black pearl roses,” Eiji giggled, holding up one of the last few flowers resting on the counter. “You can have one if you want.”

Ash wanted one. Especially if Eiji was going to give it with that glitter bomb exploding in his eyes. But where’d be the fun in simply taking it from Eiji’s hands?

“What will I do with it?” he said instead, feigning nonchalance.

Eiji considered this question for a moment, and Ash prayed that he’d come up with an answer. There was thirty seconds of excruciating silence, and then suddenly Eiji was leaping into action with a determined set to his jaw.

He reached for the scissors sitting in a little container by the sink, and snipped away most of the rose’s thorny stem, leaving no more than a couple inches of green. And then, to Ash’s absolute disbelief, Eiji brushed a lock of his hair behind his ear as easily as wind might, and tucked the rose in the divot where his ear joined his head.

“Wear it,” Eiji said, a rakish smile on his face. “Since you like how it smells.”

Ash’s heart took a free-fall into the pit of his stomach.

Woah. Yeah. Okay. He was starting to get the feeling that there was no throwing-off Eiji; there was no disarming him.

The boy said what he meant. No armour.

Ash didn’t know whether to think him foolish or courageous.

Hell, maybe it was a little bit of both, considering the way Eiji sat on the window ledge, one leg in the apartment, one leg dangling out. The slightest push could send him careening out, but Eiji didn’t seem to care. He seemed, in more ways than one, perfectly at home so high up above the ground.

Ash sat across from him, their mugs of medicine-like mint tea between them, watching the sky grow darker as the dye boiled merrily behind them.

“Can you see it in the sky from here?” Ash mused aloud as the first stars winked to life. “Azrael?”

Ordinarily the mere mention of the name was enough to send shivers through anybody’s body. How could it not, when it was easily the largest asteroid that had ever wandered into this sliver of the universe? How could it not, when it was touted as an extinction sledgehammer, as the destructive hand of God that would wipe what was left off the surface of the Earth?

How could it not, when it was locked in a collision course with Earth as they spoke?

It was only natural to wince at the very sound of the name, and Ash would certainly understand if Eiji trembled like the leaves of one of his many plants and begged him to talk about something else.

That response Ash would understand. But what he didn’t understand at all, was Eiji’s casual little shrug.

“I don’t know.”

What.

What the fuck.

“How can you not know?!” Ash cried out, aghast. “It’s got, what, sixty-five more years before it hits, right? Don’t you wanna know what direction it’s coming from?”

Once again, Eiji genuinely contemplated his question. Then, “Not particularly, no.”

And once again, Ash’s neurons couldn’t conjure up anything else to think other than ‘What the absolute fuck?’

“Is it coming that soon? I haven’t been keeping count.”

“Why not? You live here!” Ash pointed out, bewilderment and impatience tangling in his chest like wire. “Don’t they teach you stuff like that at school? Didn’t you ever think to ask? How can you not care about the world-ending asteroid that’s going to destroy your home?”

Ash could feel the scrunched-up expression his face was locked in, could feel the tension in his own jaw, but when Eiji smiled at him in that placid way of his, he felt it all dissipate like mist.

“I’d rather not stare into the face of death every time I look up at the sky, thank you very much.”

Eek. Fair point.

Ash slumped against the window frame, suddenly unable to look Eiji in those eyes of his.

Seeing and unseeing.

Unafraid, because all the fear lived elsewhere, maybe in his heart, maybe in his head.

Ash didn’t know. For as much was obvious about Eiji Okumura, there was that much more that was an inextricable puzzle.

“Sorry for yelling,” he said gruffly.

Eiji waved him off, like it was all raindrops on a windowpane. “That’s okay, Ash.”

No, it wasn’t. Ash had never before felt the bone-deep itch to explain himself, but sitting here, with the night wind prickling on his skin as a dainty teacup of mint tea warmed his palms, he was seized with the desire to be seen.

For Eiji to see him.

“I didn’t mean to yell,” he whispered, fidgeting with his fingers. “But it’s just that—I’ve spent my whole life being hyper aware of death, dodging it, looking back over my shoulder only to see it an arm’s length behind me. And it’s just—it’s just a little annoying that you’re so oblivious to it. I wish I could be like that too.”

Eiji laughed then, hushed and infused with adrenaline, like a secret. If there were questions he had about why the threat of death had been so omnipresent in Ash’s life, he did not voice them. Ash would’ve fixated on why for longer, if Eiji hadn’t leaned across the space between them to say, “Well, if it’s any consolation, I think it’s annoying that you’ve seen more in the last sixteen years then I will ever see in my entire life.”

That pulled a guffaw out of Ash. “How do you figure that? For the most part, space really is a whole bunch of nothing, you know.”

“Maybe. But you’ve been inside places that I only know of as moving stars. You’ve seen the surface of the moon; you’ve seen my home in its entirety; not in bits and pieces like I have.”

There was just the slightest waver to his voice, courtesy of earnestness and the thrum of adventure that Ash was sure the prospect of space inspired in everyone. But strangely enough, Eiji didn’t seem smitten with whatever lay beyond the Earth’s stratosphere. No, if anything, he only seemed interested in his home.

“What’s it like?” he breathed. “My planet? What does it look like when it’s small; when it’s not ‘the whole world’?”

Huh. He was incandescent, doe-eyes like gemstones, hesitant smile like an ember in the snow.

Okay, so maybe Ash was looking, this time.

“It’s really blue,” he told Eiji, matching the tone of his voice. “Like a blue marble.”

For one agonizing second, he worried that it was an inadequate reply, but Eiji latched onto it like it was the best thing he’d heard all day.

“What kind of blue?” he asked animatedly, sliding off the ledge to fetch something from his bookcases. Ash’s eyes tracked him bemusedly as he retrieved a fat folder from the haphazard stacks and returned to his side, laying out the precious document between them and flipping to the page he wanted.

“Is it any of these?” he inquired, showing Ash row upon row of blue dye swatches, all tagged with a whimsical name written in flowing cursive. “Or better yet, is it none of these?”

Ash suppressed a giggle, before pointing to one labelled ‘Pre-Night Post-Twilight Sky’.

“Really?” Eiji’s smile went from red-hot to blinding. “I knew it! I just knew it would be this one!”

Huh. Who would’ve thought joy was a tangible concept? Who would’ve thought ‘joy’ had dark hair and ducky pyjamas and a jungle in his living room?

“What else? What colour is the land?”

“Most of it’s brown,” Ash said, closing his eyes so that he could conjure up the precise view before his eyes. God, now he wished he’d paid more attention during re-entry. “There’s also some green, but not a lot.”

“Green?” Eiji repeated, turning to a different page of swatches now and peeking up at him cheekily. “Like your eyes?”

Ash felt the heat rise to his cheeks like a tidal wave. “N-no, it—uh—it’s more like…like that one,” he said, helplessly pointing to a swatch called ‘Sun-fried Leaf’.

“Hmm. Makes sense, I guess,” Eiji said, his voice ten times sweeter; twenty times more decadent than any of the brownies he’d made. “I’ve never seen a green quite like the green of your eyes.”

Oh. Oh, so that’s what those looks had been about yesterday.

Ash wondered then if he should tell Eiji.

About how he’d been middle-named after the colour of his eyes. About the woman who’d given him said middle name. About the man who’d had a darker, kinder version of that green in his eyes. About how they were both dead now.

He wondered this, but then the moon began to rise in the sky, and Eiji’s fingers brushed against his own as he refilled their cups with mint tea. The voices of the neighbourhood began to come to them in snatches upon the wind, and the rose in his hair began to cloud his senses to all that was drab in the universe, and it occurred to Ash: Why stare into the face of death?

Why stare into the face of death, when he could stare at the moonrise that granted even the most mutilated buildings haunting grace?

Why stare into the face of death, when he could stare at the erratically illuminated Wolfsbane Settlement extend out in front of him like an invitation?

Why stare into the face of death, when he could stare at Eiji?

Chapter Text

Entry #2          Rim-of-the-Earth Indigo

The colour of diving headfirst.

The colour of rarity, the colour of broadening horizons.

The colour of persistent wildflower weeds, peace-bringing Jays, precarious Giant stars.

The color of porcelain uncontainable sky, the colour of adrenaline.

The colour of defiance.

---

Reason #1 to Hate School: It began at 5 AM.

Ash cursed as an insistent bicycle bell shattered the silence for the third time that morning.

“Ash! What is taking so long; we’re going to be late!”

Eiji’s voice was muffled by an entire foot of concrete, but Ash heard it nevertheless, its usual strawberry-candy quality soured by urgency. He picked up his pace, hurtling down the stairwell double time with a backpack thrown over one shoulder. His fully charged brick of a phone was clutched in one hand, his hair was still wet from a hasty shower and his Red Chucks were half-worn and unlaced.

4.27 AM, it read when Ash dared to slow down enough to check it.

God, this was insane. It was miracle enough that he’d managed to get himself up twenty minutes ago, considering that he was not in the habit of poking his head out of his blanket any time before noon. And now his poor protesting legs were having to contend with half-made stairs in the near-dark. Ash squinted, willing his eyes to adjust to the scarce, inky light if for no other reason than to prevent him from crashing face-first onto the landing as he raced down. Shivering as he went, he zipped up his open hoodie in some effort to keep the pre-dawn frost from spiderwebbing all over his skin.

Whose idea was this? Whose fucking idea was it to start school at 5 AM?

From all the research Ash had read, adolescent brains didn’t even start kicking until 10 AM. His circadian rhythms weren’t meant to be waking and breakfasting and packing a bag and sprinting down an incline at such an ungodly hour.

A belligerent part of him was almost tempted to stop, to skid to a halt and plop down on the closest step, to cross his arms and declare, “No.”

No, sorry, fuck this.

Fuck keeping up appearances, fuck the stupid sun’s UV rays that wreaked havoc on the human body from 11 AM to 4 PM, fuck the Wolfsbane Academy for opting to start annoyingly before they came out to play instead of comfortably after.

Just fuck it. Fuck all of it.

…

…

…

…Eiji was waiting for him, though.

For the second time that early, early, morning, Ash bit a curse into his own cheek. Eiji was waiting for him; had been for the last fifteen minutes. And he was halfway across the lobby anyway. Might as well go at this point.

So, he pushed through the building’s front door and out into the crisp air.

Eiji straightened at the sight of him, picking himself up from where he was leaning on the handlebars of his bicycle. He wasn’t dressed as warm as Ash was, obviously accustomed to the weather enough to make do in jeans and a light flannel over his goofy bird-cartoon shirt. No sun meant no sunhat or sunglasses, so the wind was at liberty to muss his hair, and his dark-star eyes were on full display.

Ash didn’t miss the way they twinkled when he jogged up to him.

“Finally,” Eiji said wryly, knocking up the bicycle kickstand with the back of his foot. Ash scowled at him, hoping that it would be enough to defend his honour, but Eiji simply waived the cranky look away. Shrugging his own backpack off his shoulder and handing it to Ash, he jerked his head towards the bicycle carrier behind him. “Get on.”

Ash eyed the thing suspiciously. They hadn’t been able to get him a bicycle in time; hell, even if they had, it wasn’t like Ash knew how to ride one on a straight surface, much less down potholed roads that soared and dipped and bent into hairpins like a rollercoaster. So, he had to make do with sharing Eiji’s, sitting down on the bare-bones metal frame behind the bicycle seat and trying to find a position that wouldn’t raise welts on his ass after the half-hour ride to the school.

“Keep your legs off the ground, okay?” Eiji said as Ash balanced their two backpacks on his lap and pulled his knees up so that his feet wouldn’t bump into the back wheel. “And hold onto to me if you need to. I’m going to go a little fast.”

There was genuine concern in Eiji’s voice, but there was also strawberry candy and sugar glaze, and Ash couldn’t help the tingling in his fingers as he reached towards his back with his free hand.

“I’m ready. Let’s go.”

---

Reason #1 to Like School: Ash got to go to it with his head resting on Eiji’s back, and one arm circled loosely around his waist.

God, he was so warm.

Warm and firm with just the right amount of give, the scent of the veritable forest of plants in his home suffused into his skin and clothes.

Wet earth. Young leaves. Dying flowers. Near-ripe fruit.

Like a rain-fresh world. Like a secret garden. Like life most unleashed.

Ash had to physically restrain himself from nuzzling into his shoulder blades.

He settled for just laying there, his temple pressed into the middle of Eiji’s back as he watched the buildings flit by through half-closed eyes. It wasn’t quiet by any means, but there was so much distance around them that even sound was having a hard time traversing the landscape to leak into Ash’s ears and disrupt his peace. And the way Eiji pedalled, the way the bicycle’s chains whirred slightly in his periphery…it was almost like a lullaby…

“Hey! Don’t fall asleep on me!”

Ash jolted from his doze and glared at Eiji, who took a split-second to send him a stern look over his shoulder.

“Rude,” Ash muttered groggily, digging one fingernail into Eiji’s side hard enough to make him squirm as they rounded the bend into a new neighbourhood. “First you drag me from my bed, then you chuck me in the shower, and now you won’t even let me nap on you?”

Eiji scoffed indignantly. “First, I did not drag, I carried; second, it was a nice warm shower; third, you’ll fall off if you nap on me. You need to be awake to hold onto me, Ash.”

“Meh,” Ash dismissed, risking the slightest snuggle into Eiji’s back. “You’re a safe cyclist. Not to mention, your idea of ‘fast’ makes snails look like they’re going at light speed.”

Eiji bristled, and maybe Ash should have taken the lightning in his huff of laughter a little more seriously. “Fine then. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

And Ash, so clueless and certain that Eiji was bluffing, pulled a face at the back of the boy’s head and went back to his nap.

It didn’t take more than five minutes for the pleasant embrace of sleep to flee thoroughly from his body.

Because five minutes after Ash had closed his eyes, there was a screech of wheels on asphalt, the manic buzzing of a bicycle chain on overdrive and a boisterous whoop that harmonized with one singular, playful shout:

“On your left, Okumura!”

Ash’s stomach lurched as the bicycle banked swiftly—and to the left no less—and Ash’s eyes shocked themselves open as his lax arm clutched tightly onto Eiji.

“Other side, other side!” Ash yelped frantically, only for the symphony of Eiji’s smug laughter to drown him out as another boy their age turned out of a lane on his bicycle. Ash couldn’t see much of him beyond the oversized leather jacket teeming with brightly coloured pins and patches, but his jeans were baggier than Eiji’s and apart from the starch-white high-top shoes, there was something very laissez faire about him.

It didn’t take him long to flank them, despite the weight of the younger kid perched on the carrier behind him.

“Oh, look who’s up,” Eiji chuckled sardonically, even as Ash struggled to steady his breathing and grapple with the fact that they had not in fact crashed into the other boy despite moving into the left lane of the road. “He always calls out the wrong side; he’s rash like that.”

The boy on the other bicycle grinned at the sound of this, taking his eyes off the road and hands off the handlebars long enough to imitate a crude bow. “I’ll get you one of these days.”

His voice was not soft by any means, but it had this sort of unruly levity to it; like a rock skipping endlessly over the surface of a still lake. Unlike the rest of them he had sunglasses on—black wayfarers that hid his eyes—but from the way his lips quirked, Ash got the impression they were smiling almost as much as his mouth.

“Is this the new Starboy, Eiji?”

Ash’s eyes moved now from the boy riding the bicycle to the kid sitting behind him, who was looking upon Ash with some interest. He couldn’t have been more than twelve or thirteen, downright shrimpy in comparison to the broad-shouldered and much taller boy in front of him, wiry rather than muscular. It looked very much like he was grasping to emulate the taller boy’s aesthetic as well, if the flamboyant electric-blue bomber jacket and magenta shoes were any indication, and it was obvious from the way he held on to the latter’s jacket that he looked up to him.

“Starboy?” Ash repeated, nonplussed. “Don’t give me that much credit.”

“All the space colonies look like stars to us,” Eiji said good-naturedly, before nodding his head in the kid’s direction. “This is Ash. Ash, that’s Sing, and the reckless toddler in front of him is Shorter.”

Ash smiled politely at both of them, and Sing waved back before Shorter gasped most dramatically.

“Blasphemy! I am a very mature man!”

Ash dubiously regarded the mohawk on Shorter’s head, the one that he had no doubt cut himself over a bathroom sink, even as Eiji rolled his eyes. “You named your spaceplane Moby Dick,” he deadpanned. “Every time you win an obstacle course you scream, ‘You’ve been dickmatized!’”

“What else am I supposed to scream?” Shorter said, miming clutching his non-existent pearls even as Sing barked out a laugh.

Ash found himself giggling along too, despite his mental acknowledgement that it was, in fact, a terrible joke. Any biting remarks he had to make about that took a backseat though, to the questions cropping up in his mind.

“You have a spaceplane?” he asked. “How come?”

“Comes with the territory,” Shorter explained proudly. “My concentration at the Academy is Aviation. If everything goes well this year, I’ll graduate with a space-pilot’s license.”

Space-pilot? Ash couldn’t help the confused scrunch in his brow.

Sure, Eiji had mentioned to him that the Academy was a bit unconventional, but…yeesh, what kind of school was this exactly?

“Must be nice,” Sing said, wistfully staring up at the empty sky above them. “Flying planes all day and chilling out on the roof while the rest of us have to read boring history books in a pressure-cooker classroom.”

“Aww, you think they won’t make you read any books when you declare your Aviation concentration next year?” Shorter snickered. “How cute.”

Sing’s eyes widened and he almost shot out of the bicycle carrier in surprise. “Wait, seriously?”

Shorter and Eiji exchanged a knowing look, pursing their lips in an attempt not to laugh in the poor kid’s face.

“What, did you think they tossed me into a plane on Day 1 with a helmet and a map and said, ‘Figure it out; try not to die?’” Shorter guffawed anyway, even as Eiji turned away with a shake of his head.

“No, but I didn’t think there’d be anything more than a pamphlet!” Sing harrumphed, and Ash could practically hear the shards of the cotton-candy ideal of his time in high school punching holes in his voice.

“Oh, I hate to break it to you, Sing,” Eiji said in a way that gave away just how much he did not hate it, “but the stuff you’re reading now is going to look like a pamphlet once you get to high school.”

Sing slumped defeatedly onto Shorter’s back. “Lord, strike me down; I’m ready.”

Shorter and Eiji laughed sympathetically, and Ash laughed along with them. It was nice to laugh with them. There was something comforting about them, about the way they knew things about each other, about the way their familial ribbing boasted a history.

How wonderful it was, to be part of something.

How wonderful it was, to have inside jokes, to have a history, to be known.

How wonderful and terrifying and impossible, for someone like him.

Almost as if he sensed this corrosive thought, Shorter peeked over his shoulder to address him. “What’s your concentration, Ash?”

“I don’t know,” he replied, absently fidgeting with one of the backpack straps on his lap. “I like machines though, especially engines, so Eiji suggested that I check out the Mecha department first. I’m taking a tour of their facilities today.”

“Sweet; I’ll bring you round!” Shorter chirped. “Mecha’s in the same block as Aviation; we work with them a lot. Who’re you touring with today; maybe I know them?”

“Some guy called Cain.”

Shorter’s eyes blew as wide as saucers at the mention of the name. “Cain? ‘Bloody’ Cain?” he inquired, looking at Eiji this time, who confirmed it with a nod.

Sing let out a low whistle, and Shorter muttered a quiet, “Damn.” Ash narrowed his eyes. Eiji hadn’t reacted this way when he’d told him so what was with them? “What? What’s wrong with him? Why’re you calling him that?”

“Well, the guy’s got quite the reputation for eating up ‘young bloods’,” Shorter elaborated.

“That’s what they call incoming freshmen,” Sing put in helpfully.

Ash looked back and forth between them; they didn’t seem too perturbed, but he could tell, the name ‘Cain’ silenced rooms; commanded respect if not outright fear.

“Yeah, he’s a real hard-ass,” Shorter continued. “That’s why he usually does the tours; they want him to chase away anybody who isn’t serious about Mecha. Some of the branches—combat, robotics, biomech, you know—they get glamorized a lot by the middle schoolers, so they send in Cain so he can glare at them and give them a reality check and freak them the hell out.”

Now, Ash was no middle-schooler, but he wasn’t exactly made out of stone either. The apprehension prickled on his skin alongside the cold, and a sizeable amount of the excitement that had built up within him at the prospect of working more with machines started to dilute.

It might’ve thinned into nothing, might’ve morphed back into Ash’s aloof and unfeeling indifference.

But then Eiji injected his voice back into the conversation, and just like that his morale was rescued.

“What absolute rubbish! He is a perfectly nice boy; always so gentlemanly.”

“He’s nice to you!” Shorter countered, gesticulating wildly despite how unstable that made his bicycle. “His Ma likes your egg fried rice recipe.”

“She likes Nadia’s cream bun recipe too!” Eiji said, as if it was meant to be some sort of protest.

“Yeah, and thanks to that stellar bonding experience, Nadia told her about that time I tried to wax my elbow with a tealight and duct tape, so now she thinks I’m a fucking delinquent!”

“Time out, why were you even trying to wax your elbow in the first place?” Ash chimed in, utterly lost for the first time and strangely unbothered that he was.

Shorter gave him a broad wink. “I had, um, consumed a lot of orange juice, of the, uh, the adulterated variety, if you catch my drift.”

Ash caught his drift. He may as well have hurled his drift in Ash’s direction, what with the way his voice flaunted insinuation. “You were drunk?”

“And unstoppable.”

Eiji sighed histrionically then, casting a disapproving look at Shorter. “This is what we get, for leaving you unattended at a New Year's Eve party.”

“Fuck off; you shook your ass plenty at that party!”

Oh, now that was an image. That was an image and a half.

“I did not shake anything!” Eiji squeaked, turning scarlet. “I was only—Ash, if you do not stop laughing, I will shake you off this bike, right here, right now!”

“I’d like to see you try,” Ash retorted, laughter spilling shamelessly from his throat as he locked both arms around Eiji’s waist in an unyielding hug. His heart would’ve pitter-pattered more if he’d have thought about it for just a second longer, but for once, his clamouring mind was not pouring poison on his impulses. “I’ve got a hold of you now!”

“Ash!” Eiji giggled despite himself, clawing half-heartedly at where Ash’s splayed fingers purposely danced over his thin t-shirt. “Ash, let go!”

“Sorry, no can do; I’ll fall if I let go.”

“You’re such a brat! That tickles!”

Of course, it tickled.

Did Eiji know how much his laugh sounded like the heart-swelling crescendo of a coming-of-age anthem? How much it sounded like a liquid-dream waterfall? How much it crackled and sizzled inside Ash’s chest, like fire between flintstones?

Of course, Ash was tickling him.

He wanted that sound to flood his senses, seep into his bloodstream, live as an earworm in his head for as long as possible.

“God, have your tickle fight later; it’s going to bruise if we don’t get to school on time,” Sing reminded them all, bringing them back to reality as he waved his phone that read 4:49 AM in front of Shorter’s face. “Step on it, both of you, before we all get written up!”

Shorter glanced at Eiji, the quirk of his brow alone cocky enough to issue the challenge. “Race you?”

Eiji snorted. “I thought you’d never ask.”

And just like that, Ash was barrelling down a hill, plastered to Eiji’s back as he woo-hooed with the kind of graceless abandon that he didn’t even know he was capable of, trash-talking Shorter and Sing every time they gained on them. Time no longer waded through molasses; sleep no longer mattered; the silence of the early morning was a fading afterthought.

For maybe the first time, Ash was all here, in the present moment.

Not dithering on the fringes of his family like an outsider, not worrying about what would happen tomorrow; not regretting the actions of the day before.

Just here. All here, with Sing and Shorter and Eiji.

He was a part of something. And just maybe, maybe, he could belong here too.

---

Reason #2 to Hate School: Some hostile bitch called Arthur went there too.

Honestly, Ash had been in a perfectly good mood. Nursing his speed high and taking in great gulps of oxygen, he’d stared fascinatedly around him as Eiji had slowed to a relaxed pace and turned in through the Academy gates, close behind Shorter. They had come down a gravel driveway of sorts, lined with bicycle stands and benches for students to hang out by. There’d still been some stragglers milling about, hurriedly copying homework or chaining up their bikes before dashing off to one of the surrounding buildings. Ash had counted twelve in total, all Frankensteined together with brick, concrete and wood, with the odd edifice showing off murky glass; all different shapes and fanning out on either side of them like numbers on a clockface. And then there had been the thirteenth structure, not exactly a building, but something akin to a cement volcano, rising out of the middle of this circle of structures. It was about as tall as the other buildings, its surface made uneven by protruding rods, divots, rope nets and God knew what else, and Ash had found himself wondering exactly was that was for as Eiji pulled in next to an empty bicycle stand.

“All hail the victorious!” Shorter had crowed as they’d dismounted. “That’s four peach yogurt cups you owe me, Okumura.”

“You had an unfair advantage,” Eiji had said petulantly. “Ash is much heavier than Sing; he slowed me down.”

“That was slow?!” Ash had exclaimed with a derisive snort. “How do you explain this bird’s nest you’ve made of my head?” he said, pointing at his hair as it sat in a windblown tuft on his head, giving it the appearance of a cotton ball in a tumble dryer.

“Oh, stop whining!” Eiji had said, smiling devilishly, tousling it more under the guise of smoothing it down. “You lived, didn’t you?”

Yeah, he did. But Ash didn’t know how long that was going to last if Eiji didn’t stop running his fingers through his hair like rain through a sandcastle and skimming the tops of his burning ears.

Mm. It felt nice.

Maybe he could fix Eiji’s hair for him as well. It was messy too.

No, on second thought it was better as is, almost tasteful and deliberate in its dishevelled state, some strands sticking to his forehead and others ensnaring the breeze as it waltzed past.

Yeah, he really had been in such a good mood. Mind pleasantly staticky, chest filled with bubbles, cherry soda on his tongue.

And then this guy had to go and open his mouth.

“Doubling with Shorter today, Sing? What happened; couldn’t find a new bike over the summer?”

The voice smarted with something rancid, like acid on raw meat, and Ash almost didn’t want to turn around. But Shorter, Sing and Eiji were all glowering at the speaker, so he couldn’t exactly ignore it.

It was a boy; he looked to be a bit younger than Shorter and Eiji, and knowing Ash’s luck he was probably in his year. He stood in a group of his friends a few feet away from them, blonde hair elaborately slicked back and beady eyes glinting, his mouth twisted into the kind of sneer that invited a punch in the nose.

“No, Arthur,” Sing ground out. “The F4A didn’t have any good ones this time round.”

“Pity yours was stolen,” Arthur went on, smile all kinds of barbed and mangled in relish as Sing stiffened. “Carbon fibre frame, hydraulic brakes, air-spring suspension; bet it fetched a pretty, pretty price. Must’ve been a good thief, don’t you think, considering how careful you were with that thing?”

Something cold and distasteful curled in Ash’s chest. The implications of that statement weren’t lost on him, and it only made his knee-jerk disdain for the guy more potent. Stealing was a thing everywhere in the universe, and of course, it’d be a bigger thing on a place like Earth where resources were so meagre.

Still, to take from a kid like Sing, and lord it over him like it was some sort of triumph?

Yeah, that was just sick.

“Son of a bitch; I should’ve known it was you,” Shorter seethed, clenching his fists as he made to charge towards Arthur.

“Hey, hey, hey, it’s not worth it,” Eiji cut in, holding him back with one hand on his shoulder.

Shorter looked upon him obstinately, ready to argue his case, but the force of whatever was in Eiji’s eyes seemed to stay him. “You’re graduating this year,” he reminded softly. “It won’t look good if you have any more disciplinary violations on your record.”

“Listen to him, Shorter. At least he knows his place,” Arthur scorned. Eiji pretended he didn’t hear him, but naturally that didn’t stop him. “Goody-two shoes Okumura,” he sang in a way that plucked at Ash’s last nerve. “Tell me, is it hard to walk without a spine in your back, Samurai Boy?”

Okay. That was the last straw.

“I don’t know; is it hard to breathe with your head that far up your own ass?” Ash snapped.

Eiji peeked at him worriedly. “Ash—”

“I mean, I’ve seen a lot of baseless dick-swinging in my life, but this is a bit much, no?”

“Say that to my face, pretty boy,” Arthur growled, stomping over to where they were standing.

“No thanks; not interested in choking to death on the toxic fumes coming out your mouth.” Ash stood his ground as Arthur got in his face, hands stuck firmly in his pockets even as Shorter came up to stand next to him in support.

“Alright, that is enough!” Eiji said, his dark eyes opaque with frustration as he yanked both him and Shorter backwards and turned his gaze onto Arthur. “You’ve had your fun. You’ve ruined everyone’s day. Don’t you think it’s time you put a sock in it?”

“Yeah, Arthur. If you want to maul something that badly, why don’t you go fight the jungle cats in the Woodlands? At least it’ll hurt less when they scratch you,” Shorter said, throwing Ash an appreciative glance.

The warning bell for the start of the school day sounded, but neither party moved, still taut as drawstrings, still wired to pounce. Arthur deflated first, his needlepoint stare locked on Ash as he sauntered away.

“You should watch your mouth, pretty boy. Or else the sun won’t be the only thing that torches your pasty ass alive here.”

“Yeah, I’ll take that under advisement,” Ash bit back, fuelled by his petty need to have the last word with this cactus of a human being.

“God, what is his problem?” Eiji murmured, watching him disappear down the path to their left as the rest of them simmered down. “Always has something hurtful to say.”

“Speaking of hurtful things to say,” Ash began, hefting his backpack and nudging Eiji’s shoulder playfully. “What kind of burn is ‘put a sock in it’?”

“A classy one,” Eiji said, breaking into a smile as he swatted at him.

“Oh, I see; too sophisticated for ‘fuck off’, are we Eiji?”

“It’s bad manners to swear in front of the baby,” Eiji replied, smirking at Sing even as Shorter let out a most ungainly horselaugh.

“Hey! I am thirteen!” Sing squawked, the offense cute enough on his button-face to make them all giggle harder. “Thirteen and five months!”

“Okay, I will just leave that there, or we’ll be here all day,” Eiji said apologetically, hefting his backpack and pulling his phone from his back pocket to the check the time.

“I have to get to sewing class now; are you going to be okay?” he asked, looking up at Ash with tender concern.

Ash’s eyebrows knotted in bewilderment. “Y-yes, but sewing class? What exactly—”

“Later please, Ash, I’m late!” Eiji interrupted, already starting to jog away from them. “Take care of him, Shorter!”

“You got it!” Shorter answered before Ash could ask any more questions, throwing one arm around his shoulder and leading him in the opposite direction.

“Come on, Ash. I’m about to show you the Promised Land!”

---

Reason #2 to Like School: The Mecha department looked like a ‘best of’ mash-up of every tech fantasy Ash had had from ages nine to sixteen.

Following Shorter into a pale grey clearing, he caught sight of the building right behind the Aviation complex, the twin structures linked inextricably with bridges and yet as different from each other as night and day.

Where Aviation was a squat oblong thing devoid of any embellishment save for the litany of sleek spaceplanes crowning its roof-turned-runway, Mecha was a narrow chess-piece of a building that looked like a scrap-metal yard threw up on it.

Gears, pulleys, levers. Motors, pistons, solar panels.

They all banded together to spell out ‘MECHA’ in giant letters on the edifice, all part of functioning contraptions, all coloured with every metallic hue known to humankind.

Ash almost pinched himself. Now, this was different.

This was what put all his textbooks to shame. This was what would push him through the thicket of facts and into the iridescent plasma-soup of imagination. This was exactly the type of over-the-top theatricality only Earth could pull off, that there was no room for in space.

The dork-dance his neurons were doing must’ve translated into a smile on his face, because Shorter took one look at him and said, “I knew it would blow your mind.”

“When did—uh—who did, um,” Ash willed his voice to return to him, “How?” he asked eventually, gesturing to the building’s façade.

“Freshman shenanigans,” Shorter said mysteriously, steering him towards the entrance of the building.

“Yeah, apparently there was this surge of prodigal batches eight years ago that didn’t want to wait till junior year for ‘practical experience’, so they just…did this for funsies,” Sing elaborated eagerly, clearly more interested in this part of campus than wherever the hell his first class was happening. A small part of Ash wondered if there’d be any consequences for his frolicking around here, but it was only for a moment, because soon enough his attention was diverted by a tall, burly figure, standing all business-like by the doors.

He had the relaxed posture of someone who was very comfortable in their authority, and his retro blue-tint eyeglasses made him seem like a fast-talking vintage pre-space-age sci-fi hero, at least from the neck up. From the neck-down though, he appeared neat and utilitarian, his olive-green coveralls crisp and his sleeves rolled up in a precise fashion to expose the start of a navy-blue tattoo.

“Aslan Glenreed?” he inquired in a smooth baritone voice as the three of them approached him, and Ash flinched a little at the use of the name.

He knew it was his, but it’d never felt like it quite belonged to him, given that it was reminiscent of all the people that seemed just a touch too out of his reach for comfort.

Max. Jess. The woman who had been his mother for all of two weeks.

“Just Ash is okay.” There, that was better. That was his. That was the name he’d claimed for himself.

“Ash,” Cain echoed, sizing him up as they shook hands. “A little frail, aren’t you?”

Ash kept his expression neutral. He’d gotten some or the other comment on his body for as long as he could remember, regardless of place, time or circumstance. The line for groceries, outside the U-watch repair store, even in the gym where Max had given him basic pointers on kickboxing.

“As frail as anyone who’s made it through zero-gravity drills and atmospheric re-entry in one piece,” he said curtly.

The ghost of a mildly impressed smile swept over Cain’s face for a moment, and just like that the ice of the first meeting thawed out. “My mistake. Please.”

He shifted away from the doors and ushered Ash in with a small nod. Ash waved goodbye to Shorter and Sing, who wished him luck enthusiastically before moseying on to the Aviation building.

That left just him and Cain, crossing the floor of the most chaotic state of affairs Ash had ever seen.

Every inch of spare space was demarcated into flimsy cubicles using mesh-tarps, each of them housing anywhere from one to four students dressed in mustard-yellow coveralls and hard at work on some device or other. Some soldered, others welded; some sifted through an array of assorted screws for the perfect one; others worked out calculations on rickety blackboards. The air was thick with the orchestra of all these activities simultaneously, the clanging of metal parts and tools like cymbals and the hollers of ‘Got any more double helical gears over there?’ and ‘Are you done with those pliers yet?’ the encore. Everything was shiny here, shiny copper and brown and grey, the only vibrancy coming from clumps of knotted wires and scraps of electrical tape. The smell of engine oil was omnipresent, cut with a hint of grease and ozone, and Ash didn’t know whether to breathe shallow or deep.

“Welcome to Mecha,” Cain shouted above the din, motioning to the absolute pandemonium around him. “Excuse the mess, this and the floors above it are our workshop spaces.”

“Uh-huh,” Ash said most eloquently, staring around him in wonder. “What’s everyone making?”

“In general: transport systems,” Cain detailed, waving a hand in the direction of a group modifying some sort of transmission. “Each branch of Mecha has their own floor dedicated to their work and innovation. This is the transport branch’s space.”

Ash nodded along, understanding now why the colour of their coveralls was different from Cain’s. He must not be from this branch.

“In specific: whatever the hell they want, as long as they can justify its need to exist,” Cain said, watching Ash carefully for his reaction. “We don’t build for whimsy here. All that we do must either be viable or have the capacity to be improved into viability.”

“That’s not surprising,” Ash said, measured, but assertive still. “You don’t go to school to learn how to make trinkets.”

“Yes,” Cain said approvingly, satisfied with that response. “Yes, exactly. Come this way.”

A small blip of pride rose up inside Ash as he followed Cain through a service door and down a flight of stairs. So far, so good. He was passing whatever arbitrary tests for new recruits Cain had crafted in his mind. They made their way through another door, this one cushioned with a soundproof blanket, and when it closed behind them, the incessant cacophony from above them faded into a distant hum.

“This is the less sensational part,” Cain said, showing him around the large basement space that had been altered to accommodate several classrooms, all with sound-proofed doors. This area was more organized and less harsh on the senses, all pale blue walls and courteous quiet as faces buried themselves in books and pens danced to the tune of lectures.

“Freshmen and sophomores typically take theory-based lessons before they get to work hands-on on anything, but since you’d be joining us in the middle like this, you’d have to take a placement test along with the standard aptitude test to determine how much book-learning you’d have to do before you get to pick a branch.”

“Cool, when do I take those?” Ash asked, trailing after him and peering into the classrooms through the glass slits in the doors.

Cain shot him a bemused glance over the top of his sunglasses. “You don’t want to tour any of the other departments before making your choice? The Academy offers a lot of disciplines, you know. Commerce, Medicine, Cyber?”

Ash shook his head confidently. “I know what I want. I was just making sure Mecha offered it. And I want that workshop space. So yeah, I’ll be joining, yeah, I’ll be taking those tests. When can I?”

Cain seemed blown back by the declaration, but he recovered quickly, easy stoicism exchanged for that flash of genuine marvel. “You can take them here, whenever you’re ready. Depends on if you need to study for them. What’s your educational background?”

“You know I haven’t ever been to a school-school, right?” Ash said drily.

“Still, you must’ve studied things before. What did you study?”

Oh dear, where was Ash meant to start?

Eh, he supposed he could go in chronological order.

“Well, I have the basics: trig, calc, geometry, logic and set theory, stats, inorganic chem, some shaky O-chem. O-chem doesn’t agree with me; I remember the, um, the benzene stuff, but the rest is kind of a blur. I’m confident with my foundationals: mechanics, dynamics both classical and thermo, electromagnetism, what have you. I’m not a CAD guy, and my materials knowledge is so-so, but my HVAC’s solid. Telecom kinda bores me, but I do well with electronics and optics, at least the theoretical parts. I’ve messed around with some robotics here and there, but aerospace’s my real wheelhouse. Don’t quote me on it though, I only just got into it a year ago, so I’d put myself at high beginner at best.”

Cain raised his eyebrows, and Ash realized then that he’d run out of fingers to count on. He dropped his hands then, and stuck them somewhat awkwardly in his pockets.

“I, uh, I also have some stuff outside STEM; you know, rudimentary diplomatic and military history, bare-bones economic theory and political philosophy. Also, I’ve read some memoirs on gender and sexuality. And there were some documentaries on nonconformism and pre-space-migration sea life.”

A whole minute of total silence passed them by, Cain’s body language expectant as if he was waiting for Ash to say even more. Which was exactly why Ash felt the need to clarify, “I’m done.”

Cain let out a rumbling chuckle then, surprise and mirth and something discerning in it all at once.

“Hm.”

“What?”

“Nothing,” he said casually, turning away from Ash’s near-accusing look. “Just…Eiji wasn’t exaggerating about you.”

Ash blamed the paleness of the walls for how prominently the blush stuck out on his face. There was some frenzied part of him that wanted to ask exactly what Eiji had said, how his voice had formed the words, how his face had looked when he had said it. Had he smiled, had it blinded everyone in a ten-mile radius, had his eyes shimmered in that moonlight-dew way or not, this was vital fucking information, damn it, Cain—

Ash drew in a deep breath. Let it out.

Not the time, he told himself. Tease Eiji about it during the break or something. See for yourself how his face looks when he talks about you.

See if his cheeks make rose petals look like lifeless rags. See if he scrunches through the baby hairs at the back of his neck with those gentle hands. See if he smacks your shoulder with that stone-dissolving pout and wraps your name in some entirely new emotion.

God, what a lovely prospect.  Ash would’ve spent more time drifting through that particular scenario, if Cain hadn’t spoken again.

“How quaint,” Cain mused, more to himself than to Ash. “Learning about all kinds of things just because you’re interested in them. Very different from what we do here.”

Ash side-eyed him, a little disoriented. “What do you mean? Aren’t you interested in Mecha? Didn’t you choose it?”

Cain took his sunglasses off then, and Ash saw in his deep brown eyes a sort of resignation, the kind that had affected Michael when his favourite t-shirt got a bunch of permanent marker stains that couldn’t be taken out.

The t-shirt had still been usable, and Michael had continued to wear it as often as possible after that, but it hadn’t been quite the way he wanted it anymore.

“Did you know, the name of this school: Academy, is actually an acronym?”

“It is?”

“Yep. A-C-A-D-E-M-Y,” Cain expounded. “It stands for A Chance At Deserving Even More Years.”

That hit Ash like a ton of bricks. He waited, sensing that Cain had more to say.

“At the Academy, we learn how to make ourselves useful,” he went on, melancholy tugging at the corners of his mouth. “To ourselves, to our settlement, and to the space colonies most of all. We don’t have the resources for exploration, for…academia.”

Ash huffed a mirthless laugh. Funny how things worked out. The useful wished they could be more than their utility, while his nebulous ass wished he knew what he was supposed to do with himself already.

“So, yeah, I’m interested in Mecha. But it’s what I’m most interested in out of all the disciplines the Academy offers.” His voice was like the inside of a cloud, hollow, yet reigned in. “Who knows what I’d do with space-colony tech and the entire universe spread out in front of me?”

“You’d drive yourself insane is what you would do,” Ash remarked despondently, pulling him from the clouds. “Having a ton of options isn’t always a good thing.”

“Maybe not. Doesn’t matter now anyway,” Cain said, seemingly still mulling over the thought, before popping his sunglasses back on his face with an air of finality. “I’ll let one of the instructors know that you’d like to test right now. They’ll get you everything you need.”

Ash held up a thumbs-up, and Cain gave him the first real smile of the day.

“If you make it through, come find me on the ninth floor. I’m a bit of a political philosophy enthusiast myself in my down time, so I’d appreciate your thoughts.”

Ash offered him a smirk in return. “What’s on the ninth floor?”

That was when Cain pulled his lanyard out from where it was tucked into the inside of his coveralls, and held it out so Ash could read the branch name that was printed on it in block letters:

COMBAT

---

The sun was already out and going strong by the time Ash finished the tests.

Slipping on his rose-tinted Aviators as he emerged from the basement, he ascended leisurely up the stairs to the ninth floor. His stomach was starting to emit out-of-tune-French-horn sounds, the single piece of toast he’d scarfed down before leaving the house long forgotten in the crisp butter-yellow 10 AM light that pierced its way through the stairwell windows as he climbed. Ash wished his fingers would stop cramping; wished the crick in his neck would dissipate; wished his brain would stop humming like a machine left on for too long. It was entirely too distracting to be re-contemplating just how he’d differentiated that last equation when he was passing by doors of every colour that boldly proclaimed the name of the department that occupied said floor, but unfortunately for him his mind did not cease whirring until he was looking upon the Combat branch’s door.

He shuddered a little despite the humidity. In Ash’s experience, Chekhov had been bang on the money with his ideas on the presence of a gun. If a gun existed near him in minute one, then odds were it was going to be fired it at his back by minute three.

And that was on a good day; on a day when Max could manage to get them all to safety before whatever dangerous bastard he’d managed to piss off could scramble his lackeys into attack formation.

Still, he pushed through the door, as he was accustomed to pushing through most things. Cain seemed like a decent enough person, and there was no reason to believe that he’d be staring down the barrel of an assault rifle when he opened the door, so open it he did.

It was unexpectedly quiet inside, certainly more structured and subdued than the Transport branch. Everyone here seemed to be more serious, more meticulous and focused as they worked on their individual projects. Ash spotted dismembered guns, ballistic missiles with their guts spilling out, even the skeleton of a laser. Yet regardless of what people were working on, it seemed like they all had this cloak of dread shrouding their forms, this pinched quality to their faces that belied their awareness of what they were contributing to.

They knew their work would one day cause destruction. Claim lives.

It was dirty work, but in some twisted, primal way, it was also necessary.

Ash didn’t like it, but the fact of the matter was, it wouldn’t be a sensible voice or a just argument that would stay the trigger finger of a tyrant.

No, it would be something as pathetic as the fear of the other guy’s gun being bigger than his.

Ash flitted past the workspaces as quick as he could, keen to find Cain so that he could stop looking at the brutish implements all around him. Mercifully, he caught sight of him soon enough, munching on a bunch of grapes as he lounged on one of the window ledges and took from the slothful breeze what respite he could.

“Wow,” he commented, raising a hand to wave at Ash as he approached. “That was quick.”

Ash fought off an audible groan, as he plonked himself down opposite Cain. “That was four and a half fucking hours of my life.”

Cain snickered, extending his bowl of grapes towards him. “Just be glad today isn’t an Endurance day.”

“Endurance?” Ash inquired, reaching gratefully for a grape. “What’s that?”

Cain didn’t answer him verbally, merely nodding towards the view outside the window in response. Ash followed his gaze warily, past the Aviation building and the paths that lead away from it, and all the way to the weird cement volcano thing in the middle of campus. Ash noticed that they were actually much closer to the building now than he’d been this morning by the school gates, which was exactly why he could see more clearly now just what it was that was making its surface so irregular.

Oh, good grief.

Hurdles that began at the base, and were liberally peppered all throughout the incline. Random metal rods that stuck out like spikes from the sides. Bars of varying lengths in a patchwork throughout, some short and clustered vertically together where the slope was just shy of a 90-degree angle, others long and solitary in the more forgiving spaces. Ropes that zigzagged through it all, hanging down freely like vine, connecting wide empty spaces between bars together, meshing together in safety nets at the very bottom. Cavities that looked like they’d been scooped out using a melon baller, snaking up to the crater inside the peak. And was that a fucking diving board installed at the edge of the summit?!

 “You’ve got to be kidding me!” Ash cried out in disbelief. “We’re expected to scale that…that…thing?

“Earth is a difficult place to live on, Starboy,” Cain quipped, clearly enjoying himself now. “Can’t do it without a little endurance.”

“Yeah, well, you can shove that endurance where the sun don’t shine,” Ash said as he chomped down bitterly on his grape, all his propriety from earlier that day long gone. “I’m sure you could build a decent endurance by lapping this campus a couple of times; this…hell-mountain is wildly excessive.”

“Jeez, relax, no one’s going to make you scale the hell-mountain; most of our activities are concentrated near the base of the structure anyway,” Cain placated, half-formed laughs lightening his voice. “Besides, it’s only two times a week for Mecha. Other departments have it worse.”

“Are you telling me there’s departments at this school that have to do this every day?” Ash asked, leaning forward in his incredulity.

Cain shook his head, still entirely too nonchalant about the whole thing for Ash’s liking. “No, admin’s not that cruel. But there is one department that does it four times a week. And their upperclassmen are the only people who’re actually expected to scale it.”

Yeesh. Just what kind of department was this? Ash wracked his brains, trying to come up with a field of study that would be physically demanding enough to warrant this, but unable to conjure up anything.

“What department is this?”

Whatever Cain was going to say died on his lips then, even as a burst of faint cheering came to them over the wind, seemingly from the direction of the endurance course. The next moment both their heads turned to the swell of footsteps from the depths of the Mecha building, the thudding of boots and clamour of gleeful voices audible even from behind the closed door of the stairwell.

Cain got to his feet curiously, jogging over to the door with Ash in tow.

“The hell’s going on out here?” Cain barked, even as a barrage of middle-schoolers and younger highschoolers dashed past them.

“Aviation vs. Vitae endurance race!” someone shouted out in response, before racing up the stairs like everyone else. “They’re doing a Full-Mountain Course Run, so everyone’s going to the roof to see!”

Cain let out a long-suffering laugh. “Like fucking clockwork.”

Ash jaw dropped, and he turned wordlessly to Cain for an explanation.

“Old rivalry,” he replied, too caught up in the implications to answer him properly. “They’ve been paired together for Endurance day for as long as the Academy’s existed.”

“Oh, fantastic.” Ash smacked a palm on his forehead, while Cain massaged his temples in an attempt to collect himself.

“Who’d be insane enough to issue a challenge like that?” the latter muttered under his breath.

“Who do you think?”

Sing’s bright voice cut through the din, breathless and thrilled as he came up to them, taking two of the stairs at a time. Ash took one look at those eyes brimming with exhilaration and admiration, and immediately understood.

“Fucking Shorter,” Cain voiced for them all, an exasperated sigh escaping him. “First day of senior year, and he’s already starting shit with Vitae.”

“He’s feeling lucky today,” Sing cackled. “He beat Eiji in a bicycle race earlier, so now he thinks he’s invincible.”

Ash perked up at the sound of Eiji’s name.

“Whoa, what does Eiji have to do with—”

“Hold up, Eiji’s running on behalf of Vitae?” Cain cut in, suddenly way more interested.

“Obviously.”

“Then this I gotta see,” Cain said, joining Sing in his crusade up the stairs and to the roof.

“Wait, what the fuck?” Ash called, running after Cain while trying to quell his growing annoyance at being left in the dark. “I thought you thought this was a dumb idea!”

“Correction: I think it’s a futile idea; nobody beats Vitae kids at Endurance,” Cain yelled back. “From an entertainment standpoint though, it’s an A plus plan! Eiji’s going to smoke him.”

“Hey, c’mon; give Shorter a little credit; he’s in the top 5% of Aviation,” Sing defended, practically shoving aside people in his effort to get up the stairs as fast as possible.

“Oh, we’ll just have to see, won’t we?”

Okay. Ash had officially had enough.

“Would someone kindly tell me what the fuck is going on?!” Ash interjected before the conversation ran away any further. “What’s Vitae? Is that Eiji’s concentration? Is it a department or a branch of a department? What do they do exactly? Also, what—”

“God, Ash, just shush—just, come on!” Sing squealed, taking a moment out of his clearly very precious time to clamp one hand firmly around Ash’s wrist and drag him up the stairs. Ash nearly tripped over his own feet trying to follow along with him, doubled over as he was due to Sing barely clearing the five-foot mark.

Mercifully, that awkward arrangement did not persist for long, because the moment they reached the twelfth-floor landing window, Sing skidded to a halt.

“Oh my God, they’ve started.”

Ash squeezed in by his side as Cain and the others rushed to catch a glimpse too, looking where he pointed, and oh.

Eiji was running, running like a daydream so tantalizingly out of reach, sailing effortlessly over the hurdles at the base of the mountainous course like the air was his ship to steer. Shorter was only an inch behind him, having chosen to forego his leather jacket and jeans for a cap pulled low over his face and sweatpants. Eiji also had a cap on now that the sun was properly out, and…

Oh, sweet mother of all that was good and pure, where the fuck had those short-shorts come from?

Ash swallowed dryly, watching spellbound as Eiji leaped about three feet into the air and grabbed onto the first bar on the incline, pulling himself up in one fluid motion. Shorter went a different route, choosing instead to use the foot-and-hand holds carved into the slope. He was moving fast now, decisive and swift as he clambered up the surface like a stubborn spider on a wall. In comparison, Eiji almost seemed to be idling, carefully pulling himself up on each extended bar, and using it as a foundation to stand on so he could jump up to the next one. Some of the kids next to Ash hooted, Sing included, hyped to see Shorter taking the lead.

But Ash could see what Eiji was doing; even from so far away he could understand that Eiji was pacing himself, playing the long game. There was still a lot of mountain to go, and it wouldn’t do to use up all his energy on the easy part of it.

He was biding his time, waiting for the right moment to pull off his perfect upset.

Ash could feel it, in his own muscles that refused to relax, in the goosebumps that waited under the surface of his skin to rise, in his eyes that refused to blink in fear of missing out on even a nanosecond of the action.

Sure enough, the opportunity presented itself the moment they got to the steepest part of the incline. Shorter seemed to realize that he’d painted himself into a corner; he’d reached the end of the foot-and-hand holds but the nearest rods or ladder-like structures were entirely too far away to reach from where he was currently at. He paused, just for a moment, trying to think of a way to manoeuvre himself out of his predicament.

And it was that moment that Eiji made his own.

A collective shriek of astonishment rippled through the watchers as he jumped again, this time off the bar he was standing on and towards a dangling rope. Another shriek as he caught the rope with both hands, his palms closing around the coarse material with the deftness of a florist fixing a flower arrangement. Even Shorter stopped whatever he was doing, just to join the crowd in their hooting.

Ash’s muscles pulled themselves taut. Goosebumps pebbled on his skin. His eyes nearly fell out of his head. And then he started running.

Back up the stairs, his eyes constantly seeking the next window in the stairwell, so he could watch Eiji swing himself in an upward arc, allow his momentum to carry him forward like a pendulum.

God, Ash had to see this from the roof. He had to see this as it was meant to be seen.

Up, up, up the stairs Ash went, his breath coming in adrenaline-infused gasps, punching reluctantly out of his lungs as Sing’s wolf whistles rung out behind him, a clear appreciation for how gracefully Eiji abandoned the rope and grasped onto the bottom rung of the final ladder, a good seven feet ahead of Shorter after that last move.

Ash could hear whoops and claps, laughter and cheers, but he wanted no part of them; he wanted to go somewhere quiet and prayerful and utterly removed, so that he could split his face apart with the smile straining at his lips without judging eyes upon him. A place from where he could look, look, look, and and drink in and inhale and emboss that image of Eiji and his open rejection of gravity into his skull.

The two of them were going at almost the same speed now, Eiji getting closer and closer to the top of the course as Ash got closer and closer to the roof.

Two more minutes. Just two more minutes and then they would both…

Ash stumbled onto the roof just as Eiji hoisted himself up and over the rim of the volcano-like course. Ash could see now that the crater at the top of the summit was filled to the brim with water, the colour of early night and deliciously deep. Sprinting now to a section of the roof’s edge with the least spectators, Ash held his already hitching breath as Eiji climbed up the diving board.

He held his breath and wrung his hands and bit his lip as Eiji raced across the surface, clothes and all. As Eiji pushed off the edge of the board with his back to the water, slicing through the air in a backflip like a warm knife through butter.

Time stuttered, and it seemed to Ash that it stuttered as a favour to him, to allow him to memorize this. Memorize the grace of Eiji’s form curving in a flawless parabola. Memorize the way one hand coyly flipped-off Shorter as he came up to the top behind him. Memorize the way his cap chose now to tumble off his head and send his dark hair spreading out like an inkblot on the sky. Memorize the sculpted lines of his limber body, bronze limbs sharp against the cloudless expanse.

Not defying death. Not oblivious to death.

Just absurdly, hypnotically uninterested in death.

Blue behind him.

Blue trying to swallow him and failing. Blue attempting to make him insignificant and failing.

Blue beneath him.

Blue trying to pull him under and failing. Blue wicking into his clothes and drenching him head to toe and attempting to tamp down that delighted laughter and failing, because the wind snatched it up and carried it all the way to where Ash was standing, just that fraction of Eiji’s voice exploding fireworks at every nerve ending in his body.

“Told you nobody beats Vitae kids at Endurance.”

Cain’s voice seeped through Ash’s cocoon of awe, but he found himself unable to turn away from the sight of Eiji splashing around in the crater, no doubt searching for his cap.

“Cain,” he rasped eventually. “Who the hell are the Vitae kids?”

“They are life on Earth.”

It was only a simple statement, but Cain’s voice frayed when he said it, heavy with the weight of regret and the chains of circumstance. “Most of us come to the Academy because we want to escape. We come so that we can be good enough to get the hell off this planet, so that we can immigrate to the space colonies and have that ‘better life’ that we’re always being taunted with. All the Academy departments exist in service of this collective dream, all except one. There’s just one, that’s not devoted to running away, but standing your ground instead.”

“Vitae,” Ash whispered, the word almost sacred in his mouth now.

“They’re the selfless ones. They’re the ones who will continue to live on Earth even after the rest of us are gone. Drought, flood, earthquake, even fucking Azrael; it doesn’t matter what happens here, the Vitae won’t leave,” Cain said, and Ash could hear in the scratch of his voice how much he could not understand their choice. “They choose Earth, and all the fuckery it comes with. They learn how to adapt, how to survive, how to weather the harshest conditions, how to care for the community and the coming generations. That means endurance training, navigation drills, botany, construction, first aid—”

“Sewing,” Ash tacked on, a molten sort of smile starting to crystallize on his face as he recalled the class Eiji had said he’d be going to that morning. Suddenly it was all starting to make sense: that class, his horticultural prowess, his poised strength, the very way he seemed to look at life, at Earth.

Ash ached then to know the root of it all.

“Do you know why he chose Vitae?” he asked, finally sparing Cain a look.

Cain merely shrugged in response. “Who knows. It’s probably an awfully personal decision; Vitae is the least popular department here, and Eiji’s at the top of their senior class. Takes something to be in there as it is, but it takes a special something to be one of their best.”

Ash felt fizzing in his chest; felt a grin tickle the sides of his mouth, and allowed himself a moment of veiled vulnerability. “I don’t doubt it. That course run…that was awesome. Immortally awesome.”

“Oh, he’ll outlive us all; just you watch. He’s going to be the last man on Earth,” Cain laughed, loud and sure. “The skin will rot off our bones and shove everything we were back into the carbon cycle just fine, but death will tremble to take Eiji Okumura.”

Reason #3 to Like School: Eiji did stuff like this four times a week in open view.

Final Verdict:

The pros outweighed the cons.

Ash liked school. A lot.

Chapter Text

Entry #3          Ripe Plum

The colour of eager devouring.

The colour of plenty, the colour of not looking back.

The colour of space lightning, squashed blackberries, scintillating crystals.

The color of a sunset’s edge, the colour of enchantment.

The colour of craving.

---

“Lynx, come in; Lynx, come in.”

Ash startled, nearly dropping his pencil. He still wasn’t used to a call sign and the fuzzy crackling from the walkie-talkie echoed in the cavernous classroom. Nevertheless, he leaned forward and took his legs off the desk as he reached for the device.

“Talk to me, Alex.”

“We need you on deck; Moby Dick just squawked 7700.”

Ash sat up straighter in his chair. “How bad?”

“Good enough for a safe landing; worse than usual for you, though.”

Ash groaned, the undercurrent of concern leeching out of him to make room for annoyance that had become all too familiar. “ETA on Moby Dick?”

“Already cleared to land.”

Ash shook his head. “On my way.”

“Copy.”

The walkie-talkie fell silent, and Ash stretched as he stood up, pulling up the sleeves of his coveralls over the tank top underneath it. It was warm here in the classroom, but there were always buffeting winds kicked up by the spaceplanes on the landing strip. He swapped out his reading glasses for his Aviators and closed the textbook he’d been reading:

The Future of Spacecraft Dynamics: Controls Design and Autonomous Systems

Guess he wouldn’t be getting through more than those first two chapters today.

He stuffed the ungainly thing into his designated locker at the back of the room along with the rest of his writing supplies and sauntered out, catching the light switch on his way.

Ten minutes later he was already on his way up from the basement, taking the stairs two at a time in loping strides.

It was funny; two months ago, he would’ve been winded five floors in, but now he could get as high up as the fifteenth floor without stopping to catch his breath. Though of course that was more to do with the fact that he’d had practice, thanks to the ridiculous number of times he’d had to go between the fifteenth floor and the fucking basement of the building within his first week of officially starting at the Academy.

Because floor fifteen was home to the Aerospace department of Mecha, and it was the department that Ash had been eyeing the most keenly after he’d taken the placement and aptitude tests, hoping and praying that he’d be cleared to join it.

He’d thought he’d be a shoo-in when the reports had come back from the placement tests and declared him eligible to waive most of the freshman and sophomore lecture classes, but it’d been the aptitude test that’d chosen that moment to kick up a bump in the road.

“It says you have great potential to flourish in Combat,” his test administrator—some professor called Alexis Dawson—had told him, entirely too excited for Ash’s liking.

“It also says I would be a good fit in Aerospace,” Ash had responded, hands clasped behind his back rigidly as he’d stood in the middle of the man’s office in open defiance of the chairs placed in front of his desk.

Dawson had regarded him carefully. “Mr Glenreed. I won’t insult you by reading your IQ score back to you; I’m sure you know how smart you are.”

How Ash had managed to bite back the instinctual ‘How the fuck does that matter?,’ God only knew.

“But along with your smarts, you seem to have an acute sense of responsibility and integrity,” Dawson had continued, and Ash had gotten the sense that the man wasn’t complimenting him as much as sizing him up like a troublesome system that was rebelling against the algorithm. “You’re just the type of candidate we hope for in the Combat department. And while expertise in Aerospace doesn’t make you useless by any means, it is in our Combat graduates that the space colonies invest the most money and resources. It is an honour to qualify to be part of it, and you are much likelier to receive job security and good pay as a Combat graduate than as an Aerospace graduate; hell, you might even be able to lock down a home in Elysium in just two years!”

Ash had rolled his eyes.

Home in Elysium. As if it could even be called that. Ash had been there, done that, lived the fucking nightmare.

He’d wondered if Dawson would accept it if he told the man that he’d spent entirely too much time on the wrong end of weapons to stomach going anywhere near them for academic, or even worse, innovative purposes. Sure, he could defend himself and Michael with a basic point-and-shoot semi-automatic handgun in a push-comes-to-shove situation—which mercifully enough Max and Jess had kept them away from so far—but jeez, that didn’t mean he wanted to spend six hours every day with ballistic missiles!

He'd considered telling the man this for one insane, irritated second. But for all his excellence in the things that didn’t really matter, vulnerability was not something that Ash was in the ‘very gifted’ category for, least of all when it came to strange scrutinizing adults.

“With all due respect, sir, my interest in combat mechanics is tangential at best,” Ash had said coolly. “I will be bored in the Combat department, and I assure you, all my IQ will be…what was that word you said…useless…if I am bored.”

Dawson had chuckled sadly, and Ash had bristled as he’d opened his file and leafed through it. “I applaud you, Mr Glenreed. Not everybody has your scruples.”

Ash would’ve lashed out at that, at the implication that this man could hope to even speculate on the littlest thing about him and his supposed scruples, but he hadn’t wanted to interrupt Dawson while he signed off on his request to join the Aerospace department, so Ash had bitten his tongue and looked away.

“Collect your lanyard and coveralls from the front desk on the fifteenth floor. Welcome to Mecha, Mr Glenreed.”

And that was how Ash found himself here now, on the bridge that ran between Aerospace in the Mecha building and the hangar on the roof of the Aviation building. He could hear the tell-tale wind-cushioned screech of a spaceplane landing, and he picked up the pace. Dashing past everyone in the hangar, he barely gave the sentinel ground crews enough time to read the ‘Rigger’ printed on the back of his coveralls before bursting onto the runway itself.

The spaceplane sat lopsided upon the tarmac, the flamboyant purple text labelling it as ‘Moby Dick’ distorted from heat damage, and one of its engines sputtering miserably as it spewed sooty smoke.

Ash smacked a palm on his forehead and jogged up to the poor machine even as the door next to the cockpit hissed open and the ladder slid out.

“The fuck d’you do this time?” he exclaimed as Shorter climbed out of the thing, shaking the sweat out of his hair as he took off his oxygen mask and helmet.

The wayfarers were quick to find their way back onto Shorter’s face, yet Ash caught the puppy-dog look in his eyes before they disappeared. “Why do you automatically assume that I did something?”

Ash glared at him. “Oh gee, I don’t know, maybe it’s because I keep having to replace the heat shield on this thing and re-rigging the stabilizers because you keep pulling reckless ass shit at Mach 7.”

“Awful lot of ‘bah, humbug’ energy coming from someone who hugged my spaceplane when he was first assigned as its rigger.”

“What did I tell you about bringing that up again!” Ash snapped, shoving Shorter away as he continued to cackle in time to the coughs coming out of the spaceplane’s busted engine. So, Ash had gotten a teensy bit emotional when he’d finally, finally gotten the chance to work on a real machine. Sue him. “Just tell me what happened here.”

“Bird strike. Took one of the engines straight out of commission after I came down from the lower stratosphere.”

Ash sighed; he supposed it wasn’t Shorter’s fault, this one, singular time.

“I’ll see what I do,” he said, fanning some of the smoke out of his face as the two put some distance between them and the spaceplane. “I’ll have to perform a proper exam to know for sure, but don’t count on being able to fly for the next three weeks at least.”

“Three weeks?!” Shorter cried, aghast. “What, are you trying to kill me?”

Ash shot him a withering look, but inside his chest an exasperatedly warm feeling settled. He liked to joke often about how Shorter had clouds for brains, but there was a genuine part of him that was convinced that Shorter really did have the sky in his veins; that his friend was content to feast on speed and adrenaline and the razor’s edge between technological advancement and impossibility for the rest of his life.

How nice it was, to love something like that.

Ash wished he knew what it was like, wished he knew how someone went from infatuation to intoxication to devotion to fervour.

He had only ever experienced fascination, the desire to know more, to hoard details and information and hold them close until they suffused into him.

At least that was how it was with aerospace, with HVAC, with all the things he’d studied over the years.

But with people…with—with a certain upstairs neighbour with searching, soft eyes like sinful coffee, maybe fascination didn’t have to be the end-all be-all. Maybe he could—

“Ash? Ash, acknowledge. Are you trying to kill me?”

Ash blinked himself out of his daze and cleared his throat. “I will if you don’t stop pestering me,” he salvaged gruffly, walking back into the hangar as Shorter trailed after him. “That’s how long it takes to fix an engine, and the poor thing’s got at least three other things wrong with it apart from that.”

“Aw, come on, can’t you get Alex to help with it or something?” Shorter pleaded, wringing his hands.

“Hard pass,” Alex answered before Ash could open his mouth, emerging from the air traffic control tower and fanning himself with a clipboard. “I’ve got my hands full as it is, what with admin clearing Arthur to fly this year, and Bones and Kong officially on ground crew.”

Alex was a year older than Ash, a fitter who’d spent some time in spaceplane assembly, but retreated to air traffic control this year after an equipment malfunction had broken his right arm. Ash was told that he was better at the new work than he’d ever been as a fitter, level-headed and stern without being an immovable bully; consistent in everything he did: instructing, shepherding, even defying.

Ash liked him; he was a tempering presence in their little group, especially with the likes of Shorter, Kong and Bones in attendance, who had a propensity to engage in all types of ill-advised shenanigans when the opportunity presented itself, and to create opportunities for said shenanigans if one was not conveniently open to them.

“Arthur got his clearance? Sheesh, they let anybody into a spaceplane these days, don’t they,” Shorter said, reverently eyeing his machine as if appalled that someone who did not share his love for flying would deign to set foot in it.

Ash knew there was a snide comment in here somewhere, but Shorter’s semi-regular plane-compromising aside, he couldn’t help but agree with the guy. He wouldn’t trust a short-fused egomaniac like Arthur with so much as a tricycle, let alone such a magnificent spacecraft.

“Yup, he threw off drill rhythms three times last week, just so he could loop-the-loop,” Alex told them disdainfully. “I thought Professor Meredith was going to blow a gasket.”

Shorter snorted. “Fucking Arthur. What the hell did he do that for? Nobody’s watching him up there.”

“Tell that to him. I dare you.”

Ash scoffed. “Dumbass. If he wants to fuck around and clip a wing on someone else’s plane that’s his problem. I just hope Meredith doesn’t put me on the roster for his machine; I’m not cleaning up his mess.”

“Oh, I don’t think you have to worry about that. I’m sure Shorter will keep your hands tied,” Alex snickered, even as Bones and Kong towed Moby Dick into the hangar, its engine still smouldering. Shorter slung an arm over his shoulder and Ash elbowed him in the ribs in an attempt to look put upon, but the smile was there in his eyes; he knew Shorter could see it.

It was neat, this.

People to share his lunch and interests with. People to suffer through Endurance Day with. People to laugh with and at.

People who were his friends.

---

Eiji had gauze wrapped around his elbow today.

He was leaning up against his bicycle, one foot tapping on the ground in time with the tune he was humming, wisps and snatches of the song threading into the wind threading into his bangs, dislodging the individual strands like hesitant caresses. His skin wore sweat like lustre, and his face was hidden away from the sun by a cap. A pale blue cap, which tamed his hair as well, if for no other reason than to keep its diffused darkness from bleeding into the sky and bringing on the merciful night.

He was a flower in a cactus path; the only oasis at the end of the parched expanse of the school day, but all of it faded into background noise before Ash’s eyes, because Eiji had gauze wrapped around his elbow, and there was a pinprick of blood where his elbow met his forearm, and—

“What happened here?” Ash asked, soft and tentative as he forewent his usual greeting to skim the edge of the bandage with his fingertips.

“Oh, there you are! I was waiting,” Eiji said, smiling despite his tiny wince, one that had Ash pulling away from the injured area abruptly. “It’s nothing at all; just a scrape from landslide training today.”

“Landslide training?” Ash regarded him dubiously as he went to pull the backpack off Eiji’s shoulders in the same instance that Eiji went to shrug it off. It moved seamlessly from Eiji’s back into Ash’s own hands, like a stream flowing into a much larger river.

Natural, easy, music even.

One more legato movement among many.

Ash adjusted himself on the bicycle carrier, ignoring the stop-start-hammer of his heart as Eiji climbed on as well, suddenly all too close. “The fuck do you need landslide training for? There’s no mountains here.”

“There’s no guarantee that we’ll be here forever,” Eiji countered, the grieving sigh a solemn undercurrent in the smiling sea of his voice. “Our professors figure that we’ll eventually be pushed further inland, up into the mountains, if our summers keep getting worse. So, we must be ready.”

Ash swallowed down the bitter taste of that eventuality. He knew all too well that everything was temporary, but the way Eiji looked here in Wolfsbane, with his demigod grace and his tranquil routine and his extended family of vibrant flora…

Ash didn’t know why, but it just felt like it was meant to be everlasting.

That it deserved to be everlasting.

Ash held on to Eiji’s waist a little tighter as the latter began to pedal. They turned out of the Academy gates and started for the godforsaken hill that was their most prominent hurdle on their way home.

“So, what happens in landslide training, they just chuck rocks at you from over the top of the hell-mountain as you climb up?” Ash quipped.

Eiji laughed, throwing him an impressed glance over his shoulder. “Pretty much. Though they don’t use rocks. Old bricks are better for drills; they always crumble on impact.”

“Is that how you got hurt? An old brick hit your arm and exploded?”

“Yeah, I couldn’t believe it! I didn’t see it until it was bouncing off the edge of my cap, and then the next thing I knew…”

Ash glared as viciously as he dared at Eiji’s cap now that the boy’s back was turned.

Silly cumbersome thing.

Kept the sun out of Eiji’s eyes alright, but my God, it interfered with his training; it kept the wind from doing that adorable, rumpled thing to his hair, and most egregious of all, Eiji’s eyes went from spellbinding supernova to common extra-bright sparkler in its shadow.

“Why don’t you wear sunglasses instead? They’ll block your view less than caps and sunhats,” Ash suggested, a solid 78% unselfish in his motivations.

“Ah, no, that’s really okay; sunglasses are not my thing.” Eiji’s breaths came in staccato, and something told Ash it was not the hill climb that made them stagger so.

“What’s wrong with them? I saw a lot of other Vitae kids wearing them last week.”

Eiji laughed nervously, and Ash felt him stiffen under his palm. For some reason Eiji wasn’t looking at him. “Like I said, not for me.”

“But why, though?”

 I can’t—” God, Eiji was mumbling now, “—I can’t seouovrmmmh.”

“Say what?”

“I can’t see out of them very well.”

“Huh?” Ash pondered out loud. “That makes zero sense unless—”

The lightbulb went off in Ash’s head at the same time as the bicycle skidded to a stop, and the thought remained unfinished as Eiji promptly twisted around to clamp a hand over his mouth.

“Yes, okay? Yes.”

In some far corner of his brain Ash remembered that Eiji was confirming his guess, but hell, it was hardly important. Here on the steepest part of this hill, on a precariously parked bicycle that was a gravitational hair’s breadth from rolling back downward, with Eiji’s blackberry-sweet eyes four meagre inches from his own, Ash’s brain was having trouble stringing one thought onto the next.

“Yes, I have the tiniest vision impairment,” Eiji whispered, urgent and borderline fearful. Ash didn’t like the look on him at all. “Just a little annoying short-sightedness; negative 0.5 power; nothing to worry about. Please, you cannot tell anyone; no one knows, not even Ibe-san or Shorter.”

“What’s the big deal? So, you have glasses.” Ash was trying to be calming, but his voice was still tamped down by Eiji’s hand. He pointed to the pair tucked into his own coveralls. “I have glasses too, for reading.”

Eiji shook his head, just a touch too panicked. “This is different. I cannot be Vitae if I have glasses. We cannot…we are not allowed to need anything other than the basics; something about there being no eye doctors at the end of the world. If they find out I need glasses to see 20/20, they will not let me graduate. They will make me switch departments; I—I couldn’t bear it if they made me do that.”

Well, wasn’t that just aggressively utilitarian.

Ash wanted to shout about how fucking ridiculous and exclusionary that was, but the mushier, more Eiji-drunk part of his brain was seriously considering the idea of pressing a quick kiss to Eiji’s palm. Was Eiji the type to appreciate that; would he like little kisses for comfort, for…for assurance and solidarity? Because that was what Ash wanted to provide; he just didn’t know how…how words typically did those things.

Slowly, he moved Eiji’s hand off his face. “I get it. I won’t tell anyone; I promise.”

Evidently that was the right thing to say, because in that moment, Eiji was a rush.

His relieved giggles were the rush of a waterfall over glass-smooth rocks, his hushed “Thank you, Ash” was a rush of leaves on a forest floor swept up by a delicate breeze, and the way he held Ash’s hand and squeezed it tight was a rush of serotonin and dopamine and whatever other hormones made brain cells burst into rose petals.

Needless to say, Ash rode the high from that rush all the way back to their building.

---

“Why Vitae?”

Eiji looked up when he heard Ash speak, head tilted to one side. Behind them, indigo leaves boiled merrily in a bubbling pot so that Shunichi could paint the skies blue, and a pedestal fan right opposite them kept the sweat from beading distractingly on their foreheads. They’d been chugging along in relative silence so far, plonked on the floor of Eiji’s apartment with a snack bowl of grapes and their homework for the day. For Ash, homework meant notetaking on the third chapter of The Future of Spacecraft Dynamics; for Eiji it meant fashioning strong usable rope from various wide leaves plucked off of spiny desert brush.

Ash had been watching him out of the corner of his eye for a while now, taking in the meticulous manner in which Eiji buffed the leaves with a flat triangular stone, stripping the flesh to reveal the stringy fibres underneath, and he simply had to know.

“Why did you choose Vitae?” he asked again, his voice level as he reached for a grape.

Eiji smiled knowingly, his lips parting to speak like the slow-opening buds of a truth unspoken. “I want to live on Earth.”

Ash followed his eyes as they flitted to the grapes with interest, before going back forlornly to the messy state of his hands, covered in leaf and plant sap as they were.

“Oh? No yearning for space adventures, for infinity and beyond?” Ash pressed, picking up another grape and tossing it into the air such that it arced over the space between them.

Eiji only had to lean a centimetre forward to catch the grape squarely in his mouth, and Ash’s fingers thrummed with the ease of it, with the music of the movement.

Legato. Connection.

“No, nothing like that,” Eiji replied, grinning as he got up to check on the dye. “It is not beautiful up there.”

What a transgressive assertion. Specially coming from someone who’d never been to space.

Ash was a little puzzled, a little enthralled.

He raised his voice so that he could be heard over the sound of Eiji rinsing his hands. “Is that the purpose of your life? Pursuit of beauty?” he teased. “Shallow.”

Eiji snorted as he carefully strained the leaves out of the dye and turned off the stovetop. “Pursuit of happiness,” he corrected primly. “Beauty is not limited to the aesthetically pleasing things that you can see. It applies to ideas, feelings, everything that makes us happy. What is beautiful about spinning around in doomsday ellipses in a giant metal sausage forever? Nowhere new to go; nothing new to see. No colour, no wind, no—”

“No imminent death in a fucking asteroid collision,” Ash pointed out.

“No perhaps not,” Eiji laughed, rich and sweet like a cherry on a chocolate sundae. “But we wouldn’t live the way we do now, without the threat of Azrael. We’d be quieter, pettier, fidgeting on the edge of cliffs instead of diving off them. We’d be cowards. Like most of the people of the space colonies.”

Eiji towelled off his hands and returned to his place on the floor, this time a smidge closer to where Ash lay on his front.

“I don’t want to be a coward.” He reached into the bowl between them and tossed a grape in Ash’s direction.

Perfect parabola, yet it bounced embarrassingly off the tip of Ash’s nose and rolled onto the floor.

“Tsk. You missed,” Eiji chided, swiping a thumb over his nose, and it was only then that Ash felt himself return to his earthly body. There was no lead in his chest anymore, only air. Buoyant air that made his mind float. Restless air that whirled and rearranged, that both reached out and squirreled away erratically. Warm air that smacked of sentimental conviction on the exhale.

Air that unmade the fog, and in the clearing showed Ash another glimpse of Eiji Okumura’s beating heart.

Ash longed for the full picture.

It was only for a moment, but Ash longed, and it hit him like lightning.

Blink-and-you’ll-miss-it, three hundred million volts of pure, unadulterated captivation.

He picked the grape off the floor and threw it back haphazardly at Eiji. “That doesn’t count,” Ash grumbled. “I wasn’t ready.”

For the grape. For this life. For Eiji.

Stupid, unarmoured, invulnerably vulnerable, magical Eiji.

Eiji simply bent forward, cleanly catching the grape in his mouth once again. That comet-tail gleam in his eyes, that rosy half smirk playing on his lips as he bit the fruit in half emphatically.

Smug fucking bastard.

God, Ash could taste liquored toffee on his tongue and flintstone sparks on the fringes of his sanity.

“So, what about you?” Eiji asked, another grape between his fingers already. “Why Aerospace?”

Ash sat up, leaning back on his palms in feigned nonchalance. “It’s personal.”

Eiji pouted at him, unconvinced. He tossed the grape at him with more force than necessary. “I told you mine.”

“So? I didn’t agree to any quid pro quo,” Ash said through a mouthful of grape.

“Fuck you,” Eiji huffed, going back to his rope weaving. Ash giggled at the crease on his forehead, at the stubborn way with which he stared only at the fibres in his hands and nothing else.

Ash was a little sorry then, that he was not able to look in Eiji’s eyes as he talked, that he could not bare himself as casually as Eiji had.

Ten thousand weak links in his armour, and yet Ash was unable to put it aside. He buried his own face in his textbook, fiddling with his pen as he spoke.

“Aerospace because it just…makes sense. In a universe where everything is muddled and grey and hypocritical, machines, flying machines, just—they make sense, you know? They fit into the grand scheme, they’re useful, they go to unbelievable places, they follow five rules on one day and then break ten the next. They’re constants; if you care for them right, they’ll live forever.”

“Is that the purpose of your life?” Eiji’s voice was gentle, patient, like an ascending piano solo. “Pursuit of immortality?”

Ash peeked up at Eiji then, at his unpretentious brightness, at the way he drew Ash in as much as he was drawn in himself.

Mutual gravity.

Inescapable, yet Ash had never felt this unstifled.

No, if anything the tension released, the seal snapped, and the vacuum inside Ash breathed the free air.

He shook his head. “Pursuit of permanence,” he admitted, quiet as a mouse. “I know they’re not real, that—that they’re not for me, but I…I’d like a forever. If…if there is such a thing out there, if they hand those out at the street corner, or if they fall from the sky like goddamn death asteroids…whatever, I’d like one.”

Eiji took his time smiling, pensive and deliberate like a rising sun making a morning from waning night.

And then, then he moved towards Ash, and whispered, elixir-smooth, relaxed and sacred all at once.

“I’d like one too.”

---

Ash wondered, in some parallel universe, what would’ve happened if Eiji’s phone hadn’t gone off.

If Bones hadn’t decided to call right then, if they’d still be at Eiji’s apartment, trading grapes and fragile musings back and forth to the tune of bubbling dye. If Eiji would’ve leaned in even closer, if he’d have ripped off the rest of the world’s sorry façade and shared even more secrets with Ash.

But as it stood, Ash was trapped in this particular universe, back on Eiji’s bicycle carrier and speeding entirely too frantically to the grocery store because Bones had called to tell Eiji that something was ‘finally here.’ What this thing was Ash hadn’t the foggiest idea, because Eiji had simply leapt off the floor and dragged him back into the watery early evening sunlight with a ‘Just shut up and come with me; you’ll find out soon enough.’

Which…well, it miffed Ash just a teensy bit.

Because he thought Eiji told him things.

All things, even things that he wouldn’t tell Shunichi or Shorter or Sing.

Ash was used to being in the dark with everyone else, what with the ‘New Starboy’ label plastered all over him. He was used to irately demanding that they clarify things for him. But Eiji…

Eiji had never withheld information from him. He’d barely even try to deflect questions if Ash was the one asking them. He always melted, always acquiesced, always rolled his eyes and smiled and dropped the act.

Only for Ash.

And yet here he was, refusing to tell Ash what the fuck they were hightailing it down to the grocery store for at this odd-ass hour, when Bones knew, and Kong knew and Alex and Shorter and everyone else bloody knew.

“We’re almost there; just…” Eiji said distractedly when Ash asked about the whole thing for the third time. “Ten minutes, Ash, just give me ten minutes…”

Ash hmphed and dropped it, holding onto Eiji’s t-shirt with an awkwardly clenched fist and leaning away from him just to underline that he was, in fact, full-on sulking.

Not that that got Eiji to pay him any mind.

No, Eiji was too focused on the road ahead of them, barely even stopping to brake at bends and turns, drifting the bike with the kind of easy precision that made it look effortless. Ash could hear his breathing, purposeful and paced to sustain the speed at which they were moving. He’d never seen Eiji this serious; even when racing with Shorter he’d always had that contagiously unbridled smile on his face.

There was none of that now; just a taut, determined neutrality to his otherwise cute features, like frost over a meadow in full bloom.

Ash would’ve been genuinely mesmerized if he hadn’t been mid-sulk.

“Jeez Eiji, how do you do this without hacking up a lung?”

Ash whirled around, gaping in disbelief. He never thought he’d hear a crack in Cain’s imposing voice; never thought he’d witness the stoic patron of noble Mecha sound like he was actually struggling, as he came up behind them on his own bicycle, Shorter and Sing in tow.

Eiji did not turn to answer him, only shifting into the left lane of the road to make more room for them as they strove to keep up with him. “I actually try on Endurance Day,” he snickered playfully.

Out of respect for his sulk, Ash kept his laughter inside his own mouth.

Shorter though, now who could stop that man from howling like a hyena, especially as he freewheeled past Cain. “Damn, you gonna let him talk to you like that, Cain?”

“Don’t have much of a choice, do I?” Cain laughed. “I can’t catch him. At least not on this piece-of-shit bike.”

That Ash couldn’t argue with. Though, he felt sure, bike or not, Eiji was not the type of person you caught.

A: because Eiji wasn’t the type of person who ran away in the first place.

But also, B: Eiji was not for catching.

He was for holding, for returning to, for dissolving into.

And those things…Well, if Ash was being honest with himself, he wanted to be the only one to do any of that.

But my God, the little dirt patch outside the sprawling grocery store was really not the place to unpack that thought.

So instead, Ash settled for dismounting the bike, hopping off as soon as Eiji put up the kickstand. Alex waved to them from the doorway, and Eiji jogged up to him without so much as a second glance at anyone else.

“How’s it looking?” he inquired breathlessly.

Alex looked grave, which confounded Ash even further. Yeesh, what was the big emergency; why were they all in a race against time for stuff at the grocery store of all places?

“I’d say you’ve got about ten minutes before Mrs. Owens and Mrs. Coleman get down here,” Alex said, nodding towards the interior of the store. “Bones and Kong are already inside, but I’ll stay here to stall them just in case.”

Eiji nodded and flashed him a grateful smile. “Okay, thanks Alex.”

And then, he just—just fucking ran off inside!

Ash stared after him, indignation mounting by the second. Why did Eiji even bring him if he was going to pretend like he wasn’t even there?

Shorter must’ve noticed how he was rooted to the spot, hands on his hips with a frown on his face, because he was soon sidling up to Ash, somehow looking both placating and sly. “Hey Ash, you wanna come look at some plums with me and Sing?”

“Plums?” Ash repeated dumbly, following them into the store. “I’ve never had plums.”

“They’re in season, now! Very sweet and flavourful; you’ll like them,” Sing told him excitedly, showing him around the space.

It reminded Ash very much of a warehouse, with its tall ceilings, halogen lighting and goosebump-inducing air-conditioning. They started out near the far-left wall, where there were step stools for reaching higher shelves, and Sing and Shorter lead him to a mound of fist-sized round fruit, their skin the colour of red wine.

“Pick carefully,” Shorter told him, casting a critical eye over the plums as if he were the sole arbiter of their destiny. “You want a rich, deep colour on the skin, a good weight in the hand with only a touch of give when squeezed.”

Ash nodded absently, taking the basket Shorter held out and trying to find a place to start. In the time it took him to pick up a plum to inspect, Sing had already looked over seven and deemed them too unripe, stalking about with a connoisseur’s air as Shorter followed behind him with a basket and added his own input.

Man, Earth people did not fuck around when it came to their groceries, did they?

Ash reached into his pocket to see how much cash he had on him, then settled on buying no more than five plums. He had put only two in his basket and was reaching for a potential third when he felt an extra weight clatter into said basket.

Specifically, four extra weights.

Ash straightened, confused more than anything else as he peered into his basket.

And what did he find there, but four avocados.

Avocados, that Ash had loved since before there had even been teeth in his mouth.

Avocados, that explicitly did not grow on Earth because they needed far too much water than Earth settlements were able to spare.

Avocados, that Max had told him to say goodbye to when they’d moved, because the space colonies controlled their trade and were not overfond of sharing them with even the richest of Earth settlements.

Avocados that he didn’t think he’d see again for who knew how long; avocados that were now sitting in his basket in fucking plurality, with Eiji’s panting, smiling, hopefully-pink face right above them.

“Surprise. Michael told me these were your favourite.”

Ash blinked at him owlishly, his heartbeat thunder in his skull.

“How is this possible?” he breathed.

“Sometimes corrupt middlemen traders steal from the space colony stores,” Eiji explained with a sheepish wink. “They can’t take too many, but a superfood like avocado goes for double on Earth than it would in the colonies, so we get lucky with a shipment sometimes. But this is once in a blue baboon, so—”

“I think you mean blue moon.”

“Blue baboon,” Eiji insisted. “Those are rarer. Which is why I wanted to rush over here; avocados barely last an hour because everyone wants them, and I…I wanted you to have some.”

“Understatement, dude, you’ve never been more of a whirlwind!” Kong cheered, from somewhere to his left. Or was it his right? Ash didn’t know anymore; the only direction that mattered was forward because that’s where Eiji was.

“Seriously,” Bones added on. “Eiji elbowed sooo many old ladies. Lowkey thought he was going to cut a bitch.”

“I would never!” Eiji retorted, horrified, and Ash had to laugh.

He simply had to, because Eiji, ‘please-and-thank-you-ma’am; I don’t swear in front of Sing because he’s a baby’ Eiji had just incurred the wrath of several elderly neighbourhood women just to get him some avocados.

“I was just…very stern with them,” Eiji reassured Ash, as if he legitimately expected Ash to be upset with him, when in fact champagne bubbles were bursting inside of Ash’s chest. “They were taking more than their share; I saw them!”

“There’s an avocado share?” Ash asked, bewildered.

“Oh yes, it’s only two avocados per household,” Cain informed him, materializing from behind the giant grape crate opposite them. “It’s too nutritious a food to not at least try to divide amongst everyone equally.”

Ash looked back at Eiji then, the picture of abject surprise. “Wha—then how’d you get away with taking four?”

“Two are your family’s share, and two are my share.”

Okay. Okay, the sulk was officially lifted.

Because Eiji was a wonderful, thoughtful, sweetheart to everyone, but he only became this brand of gorgeously fierce for Ash.

Ash had never felt like a nobody; everyone had always paid an unnerving amount of attention to him for as long as he could remember. But today, in the middle of the produce aisle in a grocery store on Earth, was the first time he’d ever felt special.

Like his happiness was important.

He placed the biggest of the avocados back into the empty basket that swung from Eiji’s forearm. “Don’t make me hug the fucking daylights out of you in front of everyone,” he muttered as he brushed past Eiji, the tips of his ears blushing scarlet.

Eiji giggled and put a hand on his waist to stop him. A cotton cloud of heady joy swelled within Ash, and if he’d had any less composure, he’d have sunk into Eiji right then and pulled them both to the ground, to hell with everyone watching.

“Like I said, I want you to have them,” Eiji said, putting the avocado back in his basket.

“Take a plum,” Ash blurted out. “I’m buying plums.”

Eiji smiled, silken moonlight on a cruel inflamed world. “Sure. Funny how that worked out. Plums are my favourite.”

Ash’s eyes darted suspiciously to Shorter, who grinned at him and mouthed ‘You’re welcome.’

10/10 wingman, Ash decided. Would totally recommend to a friend.

---

Remember how Ash had elected to buy five plums?

Yeah, fuck that. He could live without pocket money for a week.

Plums were Eiji’s favourite. So, he bought nine.

He bit into one now, perched on Eiji’s bicycle carrier per usual. They were cycling back at a leisurely pace, in a scattered group rather than a single file line, all munching on some fruit or the other. Ash was resting with his back against Eiji’s, idly watching the road elongating before him as they crested over a hill, the muddy blue ocean claiming the lower half of the horizon. His face was turned to the peachy-orange sky as his teeth broke the plum’s skin, and the burst of sweetness on his tongue felt like a mouthful of ambrosia.

“These are fucking amazing,” Ash murmured, a little gone already just from one bite, turning his head far enough for him to catch Eiji’s eyes over his shoulder.

“Yeah? Share.” Eiji opened his mouth, swivelling his face a tad to the right, and Ash flipped the plum in his hand to the uneaten side. He twisted around and guided the fruit forward so that Eiji didn’t have to take his eyes off the road while he took a bite, and Ash shuddered pleasantly when a rivulet of plum juice ran down his wrist.

“Mm, sweet,” Eiji concurred, even as Ash spun back around, his hummingbird heart trilling with an exhilarated song. “Give me one more.”

“Let me finish this one first,” Ash said, nudging him lightly. He regarded the plum in his hands, opposite sides curving in where they’d each taken a bite.

Nothing alike in detail, yet exactly the same in concept.

Two sides of the same coin. Two renditions of the same musical score. Two bites taken out of the same plum.

Fate. Legato. Sweetness.

Ash bit into the plum again, only this time it was the same side Eiji had eaten from. It was a bigger bite; a bolder bite; Ash was positive he could feel the pit of the fruit collide with his teeth. But he didn’t care. He wanted more, whatever more meant.

And this time, the taste was nothing less than a mouthful of the sunset itself.

Ash would’ve closed his eyes then, content to drift endlessly in this syrup-thick limbo as they all meandered home, purposely taking the long way round just to stay out later. But Bones he was learning, seemed to have a penchant for interrupting moments of bliss.

“What’s that?”

There was a dormant sort of alarm in his voice, and it jolted everyone out of their fruit-induced stupor. They all looked where Bones was pointing, at a dark silhouette on the horizon, seeming to amble through the sea and towards their shores like it’d been plundered by something unforgiving.

“Ship,” Cain hissed, stopping in his tracks altogether. “It’s a ship.”

Everyone braked then, watching the lonely vessel as it came closer and closer. Ash observed his friends; an anxious quietude had settled over them all, the air thick with foreboding as straining eyes scrounged for answers.

“Where—” That came out as a squeak, so Sing coughed and tried again. “Where do you think it’s from?”

“Hard to say,” Shorter said, placing a comforting hand on his shoulder. “With that trajectory though, my best bet is Euphorbia.”

Kong shivered despite the humidity. “Poor souls.”

Ash poked Eiji’s arm with an inquisitive finger. “What’s wrong?”

Eiji sighed heavily. There was this futile sort of sorrow in his eyes, and when he looked at Ash his smile was tight-lipped. “A ship on the horizon usually means that a settlement, or at least part of it, has been destroyed in a way that is impossible to bounce back from. It is not common, but it happens more times than anyone likes. Natural disaster; freak weather; who knows what it was this time.”

Ash drew in a sharp breath. “So…so the people on that ship—they’re—”

“All that’s left, yes.”

Ash’s eyes widened. He looked at the ship again; got a really good look this time. It was…God, it was so small. Surely, this was not all of them? Surely the number of people that had survived was greater than what could fit on that thing?

“Will they come to live here?” Ash asked, a tightness in his chest like a noose closing around his ribcage.

“Not all of them,” Alex lamented, tearing his eyes from the ship, more frustrated than anything else. “We’re almost at capacity as it is.”

“Capacity?” Ash scoffed, hardly able to believe his ears.

“Settlements don’t take more people than they can holistically support, and Wolfsbane is a small place,” Shorter expounded. “They’ll find space in Hemlock, I’m sure. There was a flood there last year, and they…well, they have some room now.”

Room. Room as in space for new people now that…now that the original inhabitants were dead.

Suddenly Ash felt the urge to either laugh manically, or be very, viscerally sick.

Space colonies or Earth.

He supposed the game of survival was brutal in either place.

“Come on, let’s go home. I’ll make tea,” Eiji soothed, snapping them all out of their funk with the clicking of his kickstand as he put it up. “This is not our fault. We can do no more than our best.”

No, no Ash supposed it wasn’t their fault.

What were they, after all?

Specks, specks of dust in the wind; plankton floating in the great big soup of the cosmos.

There was always something uncontrollable to contend with; something leviathan and deadly and so utterly random that one’s world crashed down around them before they even had the chance to put up their hands to defend themselves.

The only real difference was that the space colonies had human monsters, swollen with greed and selfishness, and Earth…

Well, Earth had nothing but reactions to the garish wound of civilization, one that humans were always unwittingly picking at and never allowing to heal, in their own bid to survive.

A wound that had been opened long ago, before any of them had even been born. The scars from it were theirs to bear for sure, but the blame?

No, the blame was not theirs.

Eiji was right; they had no more to give than their best. And if their best wasn’t enough, then…at least they’d sleep easy knowing they’d tried.

At least they wouldn’t be cowards.

---

It was 12.07 AM when Ash finally trudged back home.

The living room was dark when he snuck in, soundlessly turning his key in the front door, and sliding inside in one quick motion. It was utterly silent, and Ash congratulated himself as he went to lock the door securely behind him.

That was when a switch flipped deafeningly, and the flame-yellow light above the kitchen island came on.

“Is this what you mean by ‘I’ll be home for dinner,’ young man?”

Ash cursed. Damn it, Max.

He turned to face the man, who was hunched over a disarray of documents that practically served as a tablecloth over the kitchen island.

“Sorry. Eiji made avocado and shrimp salad,” Ash offered by way of an excuse, worrying the peeling skin by the cuticle of his thumb with a nail.

Max nodded along sardonically. His eyes were barely open, and fatigue was wrapped around him like a blanket, but he still found the wherewithal to be infuriatingly amused at Ash’s expense.

“Oh yes, I know,” he said. “Because Eiji texted me to ask, ‘please is it okay Max if Ash stays for dinner? I promise it’s good healthy food; we also have plums!’ You want to explain why that text didn’t come from you?”

Ash turned away; arms crossed and more than a little red with childish self-consciousness. “We figured you were likelier to agree if he asked. You wouldn’t yell at Eiji.”

“I’m not yelling at you either, punk.”

Holy shit. He wasn’t.

His voice was…unperturbed. Proud even.

“You aren’t,” Ash agreed, a little out of breath. He narrowed his eyes at Max. “Why aren’t you yelling? Aren’t you mad?”

Max paused, staring into the ceiling as if he was actually thinking about it, as if he was actually considering the notion. And though Ash had always been able to sense his theatrics from a mile away, this was different. This was Max picking through his emotions; this was Max trying to find the right words.

“Jess is mad,” he said eventually, his eyes still trained on the ceiling. “It’s a school night, and she wants you to get a good amount of sleep. So be ready to get chastised over breakfast tomorrow. But between you and me—” Max righted himself, and smiled at Ash, earnest fire and the most infinitesimal crack in his eyes, “—I’m happy for you. You’ve always been too uptight for your own good. It’s nice to see you loosening up, making friends, breaking rules ‘cause you’re having fun.”

Ash didn’t have any more response to that than a bitten-back smile, disguised with a petulant grimace.

Max was right. There was no argument to make.

Fuck, maybe there was an argument to make, and Ash just didn’t want to make one. He remembered a time when all he’d need was a mistimed cough to antagonize the hell out of someone.

But right now, God, he was just so…sated.

He was full of avocados and plums and mint tea, full of laughter and hooting and sandpaper music from a dinky old radio. Full of a too-fast heartbeat and firework electricity and soft, easy breaths.

For the first time, embers were enough. Ash felt no need to start a fire.

He was—peace would be a stretch, but…he was certainly at a ceasefire.

“Thanks. For letting it slide,” he mumbled sincerely. “I know I’m difficult and—”

“You’re not difficult, Ash.”

“You don’t have to spare my feelings.”

“You don’t have to convince yourself of shit that isn’t true.”

Ash scowled. Damn it Max, way to pull at the unfortunate thread that would further entangle already entangled emotions.

“Yeah, whatever. Just take your thanks and go to bed, old man.”

Max chuckled and took the win with a shrug of his shoulders, though he stayed put on his stool by the kitchen island.

“Not so fast. I gotta clean this up first,” he said, gesturing to the mess of papers before him.

“What is all that, anyway?” Ash inquired, walking over to examine the stuff.

“Entry and exit logs, mostly,” Max detailed, exhausted and disorganized as he gathered all the papers into a stack. “For the nuclear power plant.”

Ash’s hair stood on end. Suddenly the apartment felt too quiet, unnaturally still like the instant before a downward drop.

“The power plant? What’s happening there?”

Max threw up his hands, grim in the way that always made him look just a little bit wizened, just a little bit scary. “That’s what the fuck I’d like to know. The rumours were true; it’s still being financed by one of Golzine’s money laundering fronts, and they’ve got these unmarked trucks going in at weird hours. There’s way too much security… even when the staff there take breaks they go into the vine-infested part of the jungle, and Shunichi swears up and down that the only things in there are feral jungle cats, so I can’t imagine what they’re getting up to…it’s too shady.”

Ash felt a familiar prickling under his skin, icy rank fear poised to strip his bones of the nectar and fluff that he was agonizingly close to accepting as normal for him.

As what he deserved.

“Great,” he said, flat and dejected. “So, things are going wrong already.”

Max’s face twitched, like the words had dispelled a trance. In that moment, he looked guilty; he looked as if…as if he’d let somebody who’d meant a great deal to him down. Ash had a good idea of what was going through Max’s head.

He was older now, after all. Ash knew the green of his eyes was more than mere resemblance now.

At this point, he was sure it was a constant reminder of old ghosts. Sometimes Ash wondered how Max even managed to keep him around.

“Nothing’s going wrong,” Max declared, and the ugly thought vanished from Ash’s mind before it could truly take root. “Not this time. I’m going to see this through to the end, and I’m going to finish it this time. For you; for me. We’ve run from this nonsense long enough. I want us to be free.”

Ash buried his face in his hands, and he could swear he felt the chains on them clatter; he could swear he felt the grip of deadly destiny dragging him into tar. “That sounds so hard, though. I just want to be happy,” he confessed. “I want to be normal.”

“Then leave the worrying and investigating to your old man, okay?” Max said kindly. “You just live your life. Do school, hang out with your friends, sneak back home past curfew. Be sixteen. This is not your responsibility.”

“No but…” Ash sniffed. “I don’t want—I don’t want anything to happen to you. Especially because of me.”

Max waved the concern off, his bravado a consolation if nothing else. “I’ll be fine. Jess watches my back like a hawk; shotgun and all.”

Ash’s jaw dropped. “Where the fuck did she get that?”

Max wiggled his eyebrows. “Apparently Nadia’s boyfriend is a wizard.”

“Maybe you should look into him,” Ash remarked. “Very suspicious.”

“Nah, Charlie’s a good dude,” Max said good-naturedly. “Remind me to introduce you guys one of these days; he makes excellent potato pancakes for us before Chang Dai opens on weekends.”

Ash laughed a little then, an old comment from last week surfacing in his mind like a coin that had somehow learned to swim. “Eiji says to always trust a person who makes good potato pancakes. They’re difficult to get exactly right.”

Max jumped off the stool he was sitting on and cracked his back, grinning at him insinuatingly. “That Eiji kid is good for you.”

“You think?”

The words were out before Ash knew what he was doing—bashful and breathy and erring on the side of thrilled—before he even comprehended that Max clearly didn’t mean it in that way.

He clapped a hand over his mouth as realization dawned on Max’s face, and the man disintegrated into a fit of muffled giggles.

“Damn, it’s like that?”

“Shut the fuck up!” Ash squawked, stomping off towards his bedroom. If he wasn’t done with this conversation before, he was definitely done now. “I’m not talking about this with you!”

Max clutched his make-believe pearls in mock offense. “Why not? I am good at romance! I got married, didn’t I? I believe I have valuable expertise.”

“Ew, gross, spare me,” Ash growled. “I’m going to bed.”

“Oh, no you don’t,” Max cackled, following him into the hallway. “I need details; it’s your first crush! Ooh, I’m so excited—”

“Go away!” Ash complained, crackling like a burnt-out firework. “I want sleep.”

“No, what you want are Eiji-dreams—”

“Max!” Ash shrieked. Partly from shock, partly because the man was infuriatingly bang on the money.

“Would you two cut it out!” Jess’ pissed-off voice rang out from the primary bedroom and they both jumped. “I swear, if you wake Michael—”

“She says as she continues to scream,” Max groused.

“I’m already awake.” The door to the bedroom opposite Max and Jessica’s opened to reveal a very peeved toddler, clutching the corner of his blanket like he’d use it to smack some sense into them.

Instead, Michael just grabbed Ash by the hand and began to pull him into their room. “Goodnight, Dad. Ash is going to bed now,” he announced.

And miraculously enough, that was the end of that. Max bumbled his way through an apology and retired to his bedroom to face the wrath of Jess, and Ash collapsed gratefully onto his bed.

“Thanks for saving me, Mikey.”

“No problem,” Michael giggled, plonking himself down next to Ash’s outstretched hands. He was looking at Ash expectantly, like he wanted to be rewarded for his intervention.

Ash raised a baffled brow. “What?”

“You like Eiji, huh?” There was a mischievous twinkle in Michael’s eyes, and Ash rolled over dramatically, whining into his pillow in disgruntled protest.

God, why did he open his mouth? He usually had an infallible filter. Why did the mere mention of Eiji’s name short-circuit his brain?

“Do you like him because you think he’s pretty?” Michael asked eagerly, snuggling up to him. “Or is it because he’s so nice? Do you like him because he can pick his bike up with one hand? Oooooh, do you think he could pick you up with one hand?”

Oh, that was a thought. That was an intriguing thought indeed. Ash filed it away carefully for future dream-fodder.

“I’d like it if he picked me up,” Ash said softly, a blaze under his skin and a puddle in his chest, his face still planted firmly in his pillow. “With one hand or otherwise.”

“So, you like him because he’s strong!” Michael reasoned, yanking on his ear.

Ash batted his hand away, no ire left in him. “It’s not just one thing.”

“How many things is it?”

Ash laughed, helpless and tired and buzzing with the memories of the whole day.

Eiji’s heaven-song laughter, the way he was so understatedly awesome, his empathy, his tea, the faded dye-stains on the tips of his fingers, the raspberry blush on his cheekbones, his sass, his honesty, those dorky-ass bird t-shirts he loved so much, his eyes, his eyes, his eyes, so cosy and precious and perceptive and sparkly, his pluck, his thoughtfulness, his butterflies-inducing voice, oh, God—

“It’s everything. It’s his everything.”

It was ironic, that Max had called it a crush.

That word was too violent, too devastating, and instant for what Ash was feeling.

No, this thing was different…It felt like slowly, tenderly being put back together.

Chapter Text

Entry #4          Deathless Gold

The colour of treasure.

The colour of luck, the colour of sickly greed.

The colour of high dawn, honeycombs refracting sunshine, hopscotch on a predator’s skin.

The color of harp laments, the colour of reluctant armour.

The colour of preciousness.

---

There was a certain halo to Eiji in the dark.

Not a visible one, not cartoony and heavenly like an angel in a picture book, but something far simpler; something far more primeval.

Something small and majestic, like the first push of a seedling’s stem above ground. The way he was curled up next to Ash, knees drawn in and arms wrapped around himself. Would he wrap them around Ash, if Ash was brave enough to turn his face towards Eiji’s?

Something quiet and secret, like the ocean’s tides on a new moon night. The way he spoke low and breathy and almost maddening as he gave shape to careful thoughts. Would Ash lose his mind and thaw if Eiji called him by his given name now, his lips only a few inches from the shell of Ash’s ear?

Something yielding and overflowing, like a just-born wellspring cascading over stubborn rock. The way his eyes lit up the room more than the sliver of moon in the sky, the curve of his smile never seeming to tire of setting Ash’s face on fire. Would that smile persist under one kiss, two kisses, all the hundred thousand kisses that Ash saw only in his dreams?

“Hey.” Eiji’s finger tapped on Ash’s cheek, and Ash’s half-lidded eyes flew fully open. “You’re not getting sleepy, are you?”

Ash would’ve laughed if there’d been enough breath in his lungs for that. There never seemed to be when he was around Eiji these days. Never enough air between them; entirely too much space, even when they were laying side-by-side like this.

“No.”

‘As if I could waste a nanosecond being unconscious when I have you next to me’ Ash wanted to add.

“Unlike some people, I don’t conk off at 10 PM,” he said instead.

The back of Eiji’s hand smacked against his own, and Ash resisted the urge to twine their fingers. “Fuck you. It’s 2.30 AM and I’m awake, aren’t I?”

Was it 2.30 already? Where had the last hour and half gone? It hadn’t felt longer than minutes to Ash.

“We have to be up for school in two hours,” he realized, something heavy in his bones and fizzing in his chest.

Eiji hummed, stretching just enough to make his back crack. “You think you’ll be able to make it through the whole day without nodding off?”

Ash snorted. “Shouldn’t you be the one worrying about that? You’re the one who has to scale the hell-mountain.”

Eiji grinned at him. Cheeky, candy-sour, handsome.

“Bold of you to assume that they don’t train us to survive without sleep.”

Ash scowled. “Smart-ass.”

“Know-it-all,” Eiji shot back, his voice like a bite you’d actually want.

“Hey, you’re the one who asked for the fucking seminar!”

“I did. So, stop stalling and tell me about another one.”

Ash huffed, his gaze flitting to the sky once more. They were lying on the floor of Eiji’s bedroom, shunted off somewhere to the far left of his bed. Above them was a—well, Eiji had called it a skylight—but what it really was, was a sizeable hole in the ceiling. Eiji didn’t quite know what had made it; he guessed it was falling debris because the hole was also in all the ceilings above his own, such that you could see a chunk of the night sky through it. Either way it had come with the apartment, so Eiji had simply tacked up a canvas tarp to cover it. Most nights the tarp kept the elements out, but on nights like this one that boasted a freak breeze and a clear sky, Eiji would open it up, to let the cold air and starlight into the windowless room.

But that wasn’t all. He would also text Ash: ‘The sky’s clear tonight if you’re not too tired.’

He’d gone from ‘Do you think your parents would mind if you came over for a bit?’ to ‘Would you like to join me? For stargazing?’ to ‘Can you sneak out?’ to omitting any overt semblance of a question altogether.

Almost as if he could read Ash’s mind; as if he could hear the ‘Of course I’ll come; it eats at me to stay away from you anyway’ in Ash’s neutral reply:

‘Sure, if you want me to.’

God, Ash was such a jackass. Turning it around on Eiji as if he wanted to any less than Eiji did. Stupid armour that made him squirrelly and cold. Annoying fucking defence mechanisms that shielded his raw bleeding heart from everything, even good things.

Oh, but Eiji.

Eiji didn’t mind him; didn’t mind his pouting and his clipped remarks; didn’t mind that he was always later than he said he would be because both Max and Michael had the ears of a fox, and it’d take an eternity to tiptoe past them and out the front door once the midnight mark had been crossed.

Eiji’s door would always open to him; he would always welcome Ash into his home; into his bedroom with a smile on his face. Brimming and eager in the unlit house, moon rays soaking through shadows they would cut through like ink. And for all the darkness in space, for all the greyscale years Ash had been alive, he would be hard-pressed to liken the stunning colour of Eiji’s hair, of Eiji’s eyes to anything he’d ever seen.

He thought he could before, but after spending so much time with Eiji, it occurred to Ash that the void of the universe didn’t dance with light quite the same; that smoke was too dull; that the night held too much blue, that pitch wasn’t extraordinary enough.

No, Ash was convinced there wasn’t anything in the cosmos like Eiji’s hair. Like his eyes. Like his smile.

Like him.

Only one Eiji in this version of reality, and of all the places he could be, of all the people he could be lying next to, he was lying next to Ash. Gaze glittering like an enchanted lake, he was asking softly for Ash’s knowledge of the expanse of space that lay beyond this planet that he would never leave.

Point one to fate, Ash supposed.

“Let’s see…what other space colonies can we see…,” he mused examining the sky for a moment, before exclaiming, “Oh, you’ll like this one; we can see Eden from here.”

“Eden?” Eiji repeated, his expression a little lost. “Where is that?”

Ash almost lifted his own hand to point, but the split-second brush of Eiji’s fingers against his own gave him an idea. Gathering his courage, he wrapped his hand around Eiji’s wrist instead. Eiji’s breath hitched, and Ash felt a look—a look like silk on trembling skin—focused on his face.

Warming now from the inside out, he unfolded Eiji’s pointer finger from his lax palm and guided it towards a bright unblinking speck that seemed to wade through the bruise-tinted sky. “There. That’s Eden.”

Next to him, Eiji’s breathing evened out, and Ash noted with syrupy delight that he was making no move to withdraw his hand from Ash’s as it dropped down between them, their fingers knitted together loosely. “Eden,” Eiji said again. “What is it like?”

“I’ve never lived there myself,” Ash admitted, “But from what I’ve heard they’re the most agriculturally advanced. They produce a huge portion of the food crops for the space colonies.”

“Hmm,” Eiji pondered. “You’d think the space colony leadership would be smarter than creating the opportunity for such an important monopoly.”

“You would, wouldn’t you?” Ash snickered. “But for whatever reason the earliest leaders were a little too sure of their ability to control Eden, and as most over-confident nonsense does, it blew up in their faces. Now it’s one of the most autonomous members of the greater alliance. Their housing and transport systems aren’t as sophisticated, and the healthcare facilities as aren’t as well-developed in comparison, but the people live more peaceful lives. No civil unrest in the last fifty years. Which, I mean, don’t get me wrong; it’s still a corrupt democracy, but—”

“At least it is one,” Eiji finished astutely. Ash stole a glance at him. There was an uncharacteristic mist in his eyes, resigned, relieved. “I... I’m glad,” Eiji murmured. He was serene like the vaguest of sorrows, and Ash ran a thumb over top of his hand, over and over and over again, the motion the only outlet for the worry in his heart.

It took a few moments for Eiji to register the touch, and that was confusing for Ash in itself, but any interrogative kernels in his brain exploded into smithereens when Eiji’s thumb overlapped his own, assuaging Ash with its surety.

“I’m glad that Eden is a somewhat decent place to live,” Eiji clarified, and there was that beloved smile again. “There’s so few decent places now. And they’ll only get fewer from here.”

And Wolfsbane was not one of them, Ash decided then. It couldn’t be, because Wolfsbane had Eiji, and any place Eiji was, could never be called something as unflattering as ‘decent.’

No, the only word Ash could think of, was ‘paradise.’

Not ironic, pompous space-colony paradise, which bore that heavy title like a clumsy, gaudy, outright stolen crown. But real paradise, with comfort and warmth and sincerity and bottomless fuzzy feelings.

“You got that right,” Ash responded belatedly, when the tip of one of Eiji’s nails scraped promptingly against his own. “I’ve lived nowhere decent.” Until now.

“And you’ve lived in Elysium,” Eiji sighed, clearly familiar with the reputation of the space colony that bragged about having the highest standard of living in this corner of the universe. “Too many oligarchs for you there, yes?”

Ash laughed, caustic and muted, clamping his eyes shut as if it would make the memory of that time go away. “You have no idea.”

“No,” Eiji conceded, exhaling audible and content as he turned his face to catch Ash’s eyes. They looked at each other, and Ash speculated wildly about the way Eiji would look with his bangs pushed back, subtle dips where Ash’s fingers would have combed through his hair.

“Truly, I have no idea,” Eiji said, a little helpless, a little fond. “About any of this. When I chose Vitae, I sort of dropped out of the loop on these things, that had nothing to do with Earth. For a long time, I thought I didn’t care that I didn’t know about them, but then you…”

Eiji paused, and Ash wondered if he was searching for the right words.

“Then me what?”

“Then you,” Eiji asserted, as if that was justification enough. As if Ash was enough. “I like learning from you. You’re like…like…”

Ash held his breath, risking inching a centimetre closer to Eiji, and then, then of all things Eiji could’ve said, he said, “You’re like an awesome textbook.”

The cresting wave within Ash splattered against his ribcage and hardened to seashells. “Gee thanks, glad to carry forward Max’s legacy,” he grumbled, put out.

Eiji poked him insistently in his side. “Let me finish, you misinterpreting twit,” he scolded. Ash glared at him, daring him, begging him.

“You’re like a textbook,” Eiji began again. “Only better, cooler. You know about the stuff that actually matters, you’re funny, you have opinions, nuance, and—”

Eiji’s voice caught in his throat, and his gaze dropped to Ash’s shoulder, as if suddenly overwhelmed with what he was wanting to say.

Serious, strawberry-sweet, cute.

“Well?” Ash teased, shuffling down a little to find his eyes. “Don’t stop now.”

There was enough challenge in Ash’s voice to galvanize Eiji, and he peeked up at Ash audaciously. “And you have a lovely voice.”

Holy mother of all that was good and pure.

Eiji was close enough now for Ash to conceivably hear his breathing, but he couldn’t hear anything past the fireworks in his skull, past the pounding in his chest that reverberated down to his fingers, past the unabashed wispy declaration playing in his mind like a broken record.

God, Ash was going to hear those words forever.

He shook his head, entirely bulldozed as his gaze held Eiji’s steadily. “I can’t believe you called me a twit,” he said, the ire flimsy even to his own ears. “And a know-it-all.”

Eiji rolled his eyes. “Are you still on that?”

“Am I still—” Ash turned completely on his side now, propping up his head with an elbow. “I don’t think I’ll forget it for the rest of my natural life!”

“Insufferable,” Eiji admonished as he mirrored Ash, flicking his forehead. “Insufferable Ash.”

“Aslan.”

Eiji startled, and Ash startled along with him. Did he really just…?

“What was that?” Eiji ventured after neither of them had spoken for a few seconds.

Ash flushed.

“That—it—it’s my given name, my…actual name,” he stammered. “You can…you can call me Aslan. If you want. Just you, though.”

And Eiji, oh, Eiji regarded him with a new smile, a new tenderness, soft and patient and dubious, in a way that asked, ‘Really? If I want?’

Ash flushed even more, the near-non-existent light of their surroundings his only saving grace. It was silent for a few heartbeats, and then Eiji was giggling, in that restrained effervescent way of his, and pushing Ash back down on his back.

Ash went easily, his heart already in a frenzy, but when Eiji leaned close to him, it straight up leapt off the rails.

“Aslan,” he whispered in Ash’s ears, and God, Ash almost wept— “You’re a twit, and a know-it-all, and you have a fucking gorgeous voice.”

Smug fucking bastard.

Ash laughed. Unbridled, giddy, aching.

“Fuck you, Eiji.”

---

Eiji did not stare at his phone for no reason.

Truth be told, unless the thing was going off, Eiji would barely acknowledge its presence in his life, as if subconsciously adapting for a circumstance where he wouldn’t have it.

So, when Ash looked up from his homework one afternoon to find him frowning at it, he knew something was wrong.

“What happened?”

“That was Ibe-san,” Eiji said, locking his phone and tossing it aside. He buried his face in his hands, palms pushed over his closed eyes, as if he was trying to banish whatever was bothering him from the one place that would make it obvious. Ash waited for him to take a deep breath, to say more, but Eiji seemed to have forgotten he was mid-explanation.

Ash sat up then, shifting over to Eiji to put a hand on his knee. He didn’t know if his fingers tracing circles into the fabric of Eiji’s pants would be taken as support or expectation or what, but Ash hoped that it came across as intention.

As a deliberate reminder that he was there. That Eiji didn’t need to keep this to himself if he didn’t want to.

And sure enough Eiji chuckled, mirthless and clacking in a way that made Ash squeeze his knee anxiously. He lifted his face to Ash’s own, and Ash could swear he’d never looked so tired. “If I asked you to go to the Woodlands with me, would you say no?” he asked.

“No,” Ash said reflexively, before second-guessing the double negative. “I—I mean yes. Is that—no wait. No, I won’t say no. Yes, I’ll go with you. If you want me.”

Eiji rested his face in his palm. Lips pursed and smile half-hidden, gazing at Ash as if he meant more than the oxygen in the air, and that was when Ash registered just what he’d said.

“There. If you want me there,” he amended hurriedly, with half a mind to chew his treacherous tongue in two.

Eiji laughed away the budding glower on Ash’s face, mischievous like sunrays peeking through foliage and twice as captivating. “I do want you. There.”

He clasped Ash’s hand and pulled them both to their feet. “It won’t feel as bad with you there. Nothing feels very hopeless when you’re around.”

God, Ash really needed Eiji to shut the fuck up. His bones were going to turn into sugar and his brain into cotton candy if Eiji didn’t shut his pretty mouth. But he also needed Eiji to tell him what was going on.

“Why’re we going to the Woodlands anyway? Aren’t there like…rabid jungle cats there?”

Eiji sighed ruefully. “Not enough to be a threat anymore. We just lost our last leopard. Ibe-san’s been commissioned to…to document the extinction.”

And really, Ash thought he’d be less appalled. He thought nothing the space colony leadership demanded of the people they presided over could faze him now. But as he picked gingerly through the thistles on the eastern outskirts of the Woodlands, Ash found himself becoming more and more aggravated.

With every step the air grew cloyingly putrid, the stench of death preceding the murmurs of human voices that overpowered the rustling song of the farmlands in the distance. There was no path, not really, but Eiji stamped down some of the bigger ferns to make it easier for Ash as he walked on ahead of him, looking over his shoulder every few minutes to check if Ash was okay.

“Yeesh, just how many people are there up ahead?” Ash grumbled, as Eiji leaned forward to steer him away from a particularly thorny plant near his ankles, attempting to balance his thick colour-swatch files in one hand.

“Hard to say,” Eiji panted, even as Ash put out his own hands to steady him. He took up two of the files to lighten Eiji’s load. “Nobody really comes to the extinctions of mice and voles and such. But a leopard…”

Ash stopped walking. “You’ve done this before?”

“This is my eighth extinction,” Eiji responded. His face shone like a pearl, lonesome and brittle, yet when he smiled it almost seemed easy, fluid. “And it will not be my last, so don’t look at me like that.”

Ash trudged forward, only a little dejected. Meeting Eiji where he stood, Ash matched his pace as they walked on. He bumped Eiji’s shoulder lightly, eyes trained on his feet. “You don’t have to smile. I know you don’t like this.”

“I don’t,” Eiji agreed, dealing Ash an answering shoulder-bump. “It’s very asinine, this process. All of the spectacle and none of the grief. Especially for a leopard.”

Ash glanced at him; Eiji’s smile was still there, stubborn like him, soft and brave and genuine like him.

No armour, Ash reminded himself. Eiji wasn’t smiling to make him feel better, he just…had a smile for this situation too.

What kind of hell, Ash wondered, would Eiji not have a smile for? What kind of devastation would ripple out into the cosmos if Eiji did not have a smile for a circumstance?

God, Ash did not want to find out.

“Of course, it’ll be a spectacle. It always is when beautiful things die,” he said simply. “Plus, a creature like a leopard, it’s too scary when it’s alive. The only way to come close to a deadly thing like that is in death.”

Eiji shook his head, decidedly unconvinced. “In lofty fairy tales, maybe. Here on Earth, my flowers die without ceremony and lament every day, and schoolchildren make friends with the poisonous snakes on their parents’ farms because their favourite classmate died the year before in a hurricane. I’m sure our poor leopard is no different. It could’ve had itself a home amongst us, a family to care for it, even a friend if it wanted one.”

“A friend like who? You?” Ash challenged, eyebrows raised. “Have you even looked a leopard in the eye? Seen its claws up close?”

Eiji winked back. “Despite what it looks like, Aslan, I really don’t scare that easy.”

Ash shivered pleasantly. He was still getting used to the way Eiji said, ‘Aslan,’ each syllable wrapped in gossamer thread and golden leaves, restless and delicate. He’d drown in the sound if he could.

They came upon the leopard soon enough, laying on its side limply with its tongue lolling out of its half-open maw. Ash could see its canines where they poked out over its lips, but they were not nearly as menacing as they would have been when the creature had been full of vitality. Its coat gleamed despite the shade of the tree it was under, dignified and striking even though the people around them were saying that the animal had been dead for thirty-six hours. Shunichi waved to them as they approached, sitting closer to the leopard than anyone dared, a sketchbook propped up on his lap.

“Mostly yellows and greens, please, Ei-chan,” he instructed even as Eiji’s wide eyes swept over the creature. “Mind the shadows and try to get the dye as dark as you can for the spots. I need it bolder than last time.”

Eiji nodded, flicking through one of the files in his hands, already muttering to himself thoughtfully. It was almost bizarre how business-like the two of them were. Shunichi was detached in a way Ash had never seen him, and Eiji had that focused glint in his eyes, like a flash of sea-glass at the bottom of a lagoon.

Right there for Ash to see, but unable to truly access without dipping beneath the surface himself.

He peered over Eiji’s shoulder, watching him examine a litany of brown swatches. Ultimately the file didn’t seem to have what he was looking for, so Ash held out one of the ones he had, and Eiji took it up gratefully. He flicked over to the section that contained yellow swatches and peeked up at Ash over the top of the file.

“You can wait here if you want,” he said, suddenly sheepish. “The smell will be stronger by the body, and I need to—”

“I’ll go with you,” Ash interrupted. He didn’t know what Eiji thought, but he didn’t scare that easy either. “You need to, what, make notes right?” I’ll carry your files and…and dictate if you need.”

Eiji grinned at him, all lemonade and orange liqueur, and Ash drank him in as they crouched by the leopard’s hind legs.

“Okay, so let’s start with this fur near the paws…” Eiji passed the file of yellow swatches to Ash and flipped open his notebook. They both leaned into each other as Eiji worked, breathing audibly through their mouths to keep the stench from overwhelming them and exchanging opinions in hushed tones.

Ash found that Eiji was very particular; he wouldn’t accept a shade match that was ‘close enough,’ and meticulously wrote down the ratios of the existing shades he’d have to mix to achieve the accurate colour. He scrunched his nose and swatted at Ash when he poked fun at the cartoon bird on his notebook, and blushed modestly when Ash complimented the wide range of colours he was capable of making.

“They’ll put you in a museum one day,” Ash said, only half-joking as they came away from the corpse for a water break. “You and your dorky notebook and all your pretty colours. They’ll wish they could have seen Earth like you did.”

Eiji rolled his eyes. “I am not the one with the crazy stories, with the wanderer life.” He dribbled some water from his bottle into his palm and splashed it into Ash’s face. “You’re the one they’ll put in a museum. You are more art than me.”

Ash squawked, wiping his face with the front of his shirt. “I am art?”

“You are,” Eiji shrugged, like it was just the truth, staring off into the distance as Ash watched his lips form the words with abject disbelief. “Picture, novel, song, everything. Intense, hilarious, tragic, everything. You are everything I can think of.”

Eiji’s eyes darted to meet Ash’s again, and he licked his lips nervously. Ah, that last part had just slipped out, hadn’t it?

“Every kind of art,” Eiji corrected with an embarrassed giggle. “You are every kind of art I can think of.”

Oh, please. As if that little change made what he said any less dreamy.

Ash looked down at his shoes, grateful that he wore his hair like this, long enough on the sides of his face to hide the colour on his cheeks.

“Ugh. Are you two this gross all the time?”

That voice.

Barbed wire through a fluffy duvet. Vinegar through chocolate cake. Glass cutter through paper flowers.

Ash whipped around; fists clenched at his sides. “Arthur,” he gritted out.

The smarmy jerk in question stared him down, hands in his pockets, sauntering out of the verdure like he was out on a stroll. “Glenreed.”

He had a couple inches on Ash in height, and yet Ash glared right back at him. “The fuck are you doing here?”

“Could’ve asked you the same thing,” Arthur retorted, deliberately knocking into Ash’s shoulder as he walked past him and towards the leopard’s corpse. “What is he, your security blanket now, Okumura?” he sneered at Eiji as he went.

“Leave him alone,” Ash snapped, even as Eiji scowled at Arthur’s retreating back. The two of them looked on aghast as Arthur knelt next to the leopard’s body and picked up the floppy end of its tail, waggling it around like it was something to be played with.

“And leave the leopard alone while you’re at it, too!” Ash tacked on, revolted.

Arthur scoffed, cruel flinty little eyes now becoming more interested in the leopard’s head. “You’ll have to do a lot more for me if you want to order me around, pretty boy.”

“Don’t talk to him like that.” Eiji’s voice was soft, but it was all bee sting and poison ivy, and Ash was genuinely thrown by how chilling it was.

“Or what, Samurai Boy? What the fuck are you going to do?” Arthur charged towards Eiji then, and Ash instinctually moved to put himself between them before Arthur could get in Eiji’s face.

“Alright that’s enough, all of you!” Shunichi scolded, his sketchbook abandoned, and arms poised to drag Arthur away if that was what was needed to be done.

Luckily for all of them, Arthur backed off on his own, suddenly seeming to think better of the whole situation.

“Be careful who you pick fights with, old man,” he snarled at Shunichi as he drew away from the lot of them. “Things are going to change around here soon. And when they do, you’ll be on the losing side.”

Shunichi’s face crumpled in confusion, Eiji’s mouth dropped half open, and Ash regarded Arthur suspiciously as he ambled past the trees. As Eiji exhaled in relief and went back to making notes on the leopard, Ash stayed in place, eyes narrowed and trained on the navy blue of Arthur’s shirt, which he could still see in snatches through the leaf cover. He realized that Arthur had never actually mentioned what he was doing here.

He didn’t live around here, and if memory still served, then his part time job was at the water treatment plant, which was in the bang opposite direction.

He wasn’t here to see the leopard either; Ash had been able to deduce that much from that little kerfuffle. Or at the very least, that wasn’t the only reason for him to be here.

So then why…

Ash crept closer to the trees, trying to be as inconspicuous as possible as he tried to catch a glimpse of what lay beyond this area, following Arthur’s back as he got further and further away.

Huh. From this vantage point, he could see something distinctly silver.

Silver and thin and knotted together, and was that a flash of hazard-sign yellow?

Oh, dear God, it was an electric fence.

Ash sucked in a sharp breath. He had no idea they were that close to the nuclear power plant.

His spine prickled, yet he couldn’t tear his eyes away. Arthur was going up to the fence, waiting on one side of it while…

Ash’s eyes widened as a man jogged up to the fence from within the power plant compound. He wasn’t wearing any uniform, so he wasn’t a member of the lower-level staff. Shit, this was someone high up then. Someone important enough to have what looked like an access lanyard and information to share, if the little white pouch clutched in the man’s hands was any indication.

So, what in the world was he doing, talking to some delinquent teenager like Arthur?

Ash didn’t dare to move, didn’t dare to breathe, lest the two notice that he was witnessing their conversation. There wasn’t any point in trying to catch what they were saying, he was too far away and if he went any closer, he’d just give himself away. So, he settled on memorizing what he could about the man and the exchange itself.

How strange. There was something familiar about the man, about the severe shape of his face, about the way his eyes scrutinized whatever was in the envelope Arthur handed to him once the white pouch was tucked safely in his pocket. Ash had never seen the man before, and yet…

Yet there was something about the way he carried himself that gave Ash a sense of déjà vu.

What gave?

Before he could think too hard about the whole thing though, Eiji’s voice rang in his ears, clear as windchimes.

“Aslan? Can I have the Volume 4 swatch file please? I need purples.”

Ash jolted, and spun around, eyes closed firmly. Suddenly he’d seen enough. What the fuck was he doing? Eiji was right there. Even if his back had been turned, what if he’d asked Ash what he was looking at? Ash could’ve pulled him into something horribly risky faster than a gnat could flap its wing.

He drew in a deep breath, forcing himself to calm down. He needed to be more careful. He couldn’t risk Eiji finding out about the power plant, about the rumours and the conspiracies, about—

About him. And what his family was really doing here.

Things were so, so good. Eiji liked him like this. Liked his voice, liked how he made things less hopeless, liked how he was…art, apparently.

And damn it, Ash liked himself like this too. He wanted to be the person Eiji thought he was; he wanted to be the kind of art that Eiji liked.

He didn’t want to ruin anything with the truth. He didn’t want to be dangerous anymore, he didn’t want to be alone.

So, he plastered a baffled smile on his face and approached Eiji where he was studying the leopard’s face, holding out the file Eiji needed.

“Purples?” he asked, kneeling next to Eiji, and thumbing through the colours in the file. “What’s purple about this leopard?”

Eiji lifted his pen to point it out. “See this part here? Near the mouth?”

Ash took one look at the discolorations near the leopard’s tongue and jaw and his heart dropped like a stone into his stomach.

Yes, it was purple. And purple in a way that Ash was well-acquainted with, from all the crime scene photographs Max and Jess had often left lying around on the dinner table while he’d been growing up.

It was poison. The leopard had somehow ingested a synthetic poison.

“Weird,” Ash muttered, for want of something to say. He looked over at Eiji; he didn’t seem to think anything was amiss as he compared dye swatches to the area. Maybe he thought it was just something that happened to the body when the animal died. Granted, Ash had only ever seen poisons do that to humans. Maybe it wouldn’t have the same effect on animals; maybe he was overreacting and—

“Very weird.”

Ash’s head snapped over to his left; Shunichi was also poring over the animal apprehensively. Their eyes met in silent agreement, and Ash knew his first impression about the cause of the purple tint was correct.

The temperature around him seemed to drop, and Ash stared into the interiors of the Woodlands as Max’s words resounded in his head.

Even when the staff there take breaks they go into the vine-infested part of the jungle.

The only things in there are feral jungle cats, so I can’t imagine what they’re getting up to.

It’s too shady.

Yup. He needed to tell Max.

---

“A high-level operative, you say? Are you sure?”

Ash nodded vehemently. He was sitting across from Max and Jess at the kitchen island, Max grimacing at his notes and Jess regarding him with exasperated concern. “Positive,” Ash told them. “He had one of those green lanyards.”

Jess grabbed Max’s arm. “That’s a Level 5 clearance.”

Max groaned, leafing through his notes. “Well, this certainly complicates things. What’s a guy like that doing handing shit off to some middling Aviation kid?”

“Arthur’s more than that, though,” Ash pointed out, recalling the day he’d first had the displeasure of meeting him. “He never admitted to anything, but…Shorter was sure he stole Sing’s bike last year. It sounded like he was into some sketchy shit; maybe he’s involved in whatever’s happening at the power plant.”

Jess seemed loath to accept that theory. “I don’t know about that, kiddo. Even petty criminals know better than doing this kind of stuff in broad daylight. Surely someone who’s involved in the power plant’s mess would be more careful?”

“Sure, if that someone had half a brain and quarter of a self-preservation instinct,” Ash argued, undeterred. “But Arthur doesn’t think of himself as a petty criminal. He thinks he’s some prince of darkness destined for greatness, so he doesn’t think he has to hide what he’s doing. If anything, I think he wants everyone to know he’s bad news, so they’ll be afraid of him.”

Max glanced at him doubtfully. “Ash, bud, look we get that you hate this kid, and it’s justified but—”

“He threatened Shunichi, Max.”

Both Max and Jess balked, and Ash went on, determined.

“It’s one thing to say ‘watch who you piss off’ to the rest of us kids; it’s a whole other thing to say that to a grown-ass adult that is very publicly friends with a cop. I’m telling you, if anyone knows what’s happening at that power plant, it’s Arthur.”

Max sighed. “Okay, but—”

“Ash’s got good instincts, Max,” Jess interrupted, shooting Ash a kind smile. “It’s worth looking into.”

Max shook his head. “I’m not saying he’s wrong. I’m saying what now?”

“Now, we bring Charlie into the loop for real,” Jess proposed. “If Arthur’s a serial offender, then he’s gotta have a record. We need information, known associates, all of that, if we’re going to link him to the power plant.”

“Right, you do that,” Max concurred. “I think I’ll focus on looking into the Level 5 operatives at the plant. See if I can’t scare up some possible suspects who’d fit the profile of our mystery man.”

“What about me? What do I do?”

Two pairs of guilty gazes settled on Ash. He swallowed and waited for the other shoe to drop.

Jess didn’t seem to know how to answer the question, and Ash knew exactly why. The dilemma in her mind was plain to him too. He went to school with Arthur, studied in a department that intersected with Arthur’s, and all his friends had known Arthur for years. It would be a no-brainer to ask Ash to see what he could find out.

And yet for some reason, neither Max nor Jess was making that demand.

“You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to,” Max said at length, sincere and resolute. “I meant what I told you before, kiddo. This is not your responsibility. Not that we don’t appreciate your input, you’re a damned smart punk, but the world is not going to end if you just look the other way on this one.”

Huh. It seemed that if Ash was lucky in one thing, it was in the grown-ups who’d been entrusted to care for him.

“Max is right,” Jess reassured when Ash looked to her, still incredulous. “We see how happy you’ve been these past few months, and we don’t want to ask anything of you that’ll get in the way of that.”

The beginnings of a smile began to pull at Ash’s cheeks, only to flee when Jess turned her trademark stern glare onto him. “Although, if you sneak out past curfew to Eiji’s house on a school night again, I will ground you and confiscate your cell phone; I don’t care how happy that boy makes you.”

“Wha—how did you even find out about that? I wait till you guys fall asleep!” Ash blurted out, flustered beyond belief.

“Max snores, kiddo. Just because I’m in bed doesn’t mean I’m asleep.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake!”

“Language, Ash!”

---

It took Shunichi three weeks to complete the leopard painting.

Ash was struck by the attention to detail in it when he went with Eiji to see it, each spot on the creature’s coat placed precisely in the right place, a profound sense of horror and solemnity emanating from the image. But as much as it was a magnificent recreation of what he had seen that day, it didn’t reflect any of the emotions Ash had felt when he’d first seen the leopard.

Shunichi’s painting was almost sharp, wounding and harsh in a way that Ash didn’t remember the atmosphere being.

There was no mourning in the picture, no placid honour for the last in a long line of tenacious beasts.

Just like Eiji had said. All of the spectacle; none of the grief.

Ash wondered if this was what the people who’d commissioned the painting had requested. A crisp memorialization instead of a funeral.

“Do you know what the buyer will do with the painting?” he asked Eiji as they secured the glass jars of leftover dye in a carton.

Eiji checked that all the jars were sealed one last time, and then hefted the carton. “Extinction paintings usually go to the MIRA.”

“The Museum of Interstellar Relics and Art,” Ash mumbled to himself as they bid Shunichi goodbye and made their way over to Eiji’s bicycle. “I’ve always wanted to go there.”

Eiji regarded him curiously as he sat down on the carrier. “Why haven’t you? Isn’t it in Elysium?”

Ash gulped and took the carton out of Eiji’s hands to balance on his knees. The MIRA was in Elysium, but Max had gotten himself and anyone who bore the Glenreed name banned from there after he’d broken into its archives for a story. At the time, that had been the incident that had precipitated the scandal that had forced them to relocate.

But of course, he couldn’t tell Eiji that.

“My parents were always too busy to bring me,” Ash fibbed instead.

Eiji smiled at him, small and fleeting like a daisy petal in the wind. “That’s too bad.”

Eiji hopped on the bicycle, and Ash lay his heavy head on his back as they began their trip back home. He felt like there was wax stuck to the inside of his lungs. He always did when he lied to Eiji.

But Eiji was warmer than the early twilight breeze in his hair, and even wax has a melting point.

It did not take long for Ash to relax against him, just like he always did. “What’re you going to do with all this extra dye?” he asked. “It doesn’t have a very long shelf life, does it?”

Eiji was silent for a few moments; long enough for Ash to think that he hadn’t heard him. But then there was a tentative, “Do you really want to know?”

“’Course,” Ash answered, digging his chin into Eiji’s right shoulder-blade. “Tell me.”

“It’ll be easier to show you.”

They dropped that topic of conversation until they got back to Eiji’s apartment. They didn’t even address it while Eiji bustled about the kitchen as he fixed them sandwiches for dinner, or even while Ash helped him wash up and do the dishes. And just when Ash had thought that Eiji had completely forgotten about the whole thing, Eiji was tugging on his shirt sleeve and leading him to the second bedroom in the apartment, the one that Ash had never seen the inside of because its door was always firmly closed whenever he came over.

Yet today that door opened to him, only a little creaky as Ash stepped from the unconventional living room into a downright mesmerizing space.

Not a place to sit in this room, only a merciful swirling draft of air, let in from a little slit of a window. There were a few mismatched shelves lining the right wall, sagging under the weight of mixing bowls, palettes, spare jars, and faded aprons. Two metal bedframes rested with their legs against the left wall, accompanied by a couple of rickety old stools, a few easels and what looked like home-made canvases for painting.

Eiji flicked on the lamps for light, and that was when Ash truly saw the plethora of little paintings clipped onto the bedframes, none of them as large as those that Ash had seen in Shunichi’s house, but utterly breath-taking, nonetheless.

Ash’s eyes travelled slowly over the pictures.

A solitary sage plant amongst the rubble of a landslide. A baby bird leaping from a nest of broken eggs.

Not a care for lines and definitions in these pictures; these were diffused and feverish instead, shimmering with an urgent sort of verve.

A child on a bicycle zooming down a pot-holed hill. A warm pot of soup, bubbling by an empty refrigerator.

So non-devastating. So bursting with bittersweet joy. Spider-silk strong; spider-silk fragile.

Red lightning. Blue grass. Golden sea.

The colours didn’t correspond to how anything looked in real life, but perhaps that was the point. Or perhaps there wasn’t a point at all.

Existence didn’t need a point, the paintings said. To exist, to survive, was miracle enough, was celebration enough, was art enough.

“What do you think? Are they any good?”

Only when he heard Eiji’s voice did Ash register that he was smiling. Ear-to-ear, in his eyes, in his heart, in the pit of his stomach, in the tips of his toes.

“Any good,” Ash breathed, “doesn’t even begin to cover it.”

Eiji beamed, firefly-bright in the softly lit room. “It makes me happy. I just use whatever colours I have on hand, so they’re a bit crude. You’re the first to see them.”

Ash watched the light dance in his eyes. “What about Shunichi?”

“Oh God, not yet; maybe when I’m more confident. I don’t want to disappoint him.”

Ash smirked. “But you were okay with the prospect of disappointing me?”

Eiji flinched away from him dramatically, and Ash laughed, altogether too loud for the worshipful air in the room.

“It’s not that,” Eiji threw back, impish sparks in his honest voice. “I just wasn’t okay keeping it from you any longer.”

Ash couldn’t help the flash of guilt. He was keeping so much from Eiji.

Oh, but how Eiji smiled. Hesitant like a butterfly just figuring out to fly, elated like water bursting from a dam. He made it difficult to wallow in self-reproach for too long.

A demigod in his strength, Eiji. A force of nature in his vulnerability, Eiji.

“Will you teach me?” Ash asked hopefully. “To paint?”

Eiji searched his face, surprised. “You want to learn?”

“I want to see what makes you so happy.”

“It’s a messy process. And I’m barely qualified.”

“Hm, don’t care. Also, that second part’s just a filthy fucking lie.”

That pulled a guffaw out of Eiji, and he jerked his head in the direction of the shelves. “Grab an apron then, young grasshopper.”

Ash rolled his eyes but did as he was told. He helped Eiji arrange the mixing bowls and palettes on the work-stools and bring out the dye jars they’d gotten from Shunichi earlier. Eiji fitted him out with his own canvas mounted on one of the easels, and then prepared one for himself right opposite.

Ash surveyed the colours laid out between them. They were mostly yellows and tans, with some dark greens, intense browns and even a charcoal black and dusty pink thrown in.

What could he make with those?

He was still mulling over this as Eiji explained how to dilute the dyes with water to make lighter shades, and how long to wait before trying to apply a second coat. It was only at the end of Eiji’s spiel that another important detail hit Ash upside the head.

“Wait what do we paint with?”

Eiji grinned and held up his hand in front of his face. Ash blinked at him stupidly until his meaning sunk in a moment later.

“You can’t be serious,” he spluttered.

Eiji simply splashed some of the butter-yellow dye onto his canvas in response. “Paintbrushes are incredibly expensive, you know,” he said, entirely too amused at Ash’s expense. “Even Ibe-san can afford only three. I haven’t saved up enough for one yet, so I must make do with my hands.”

Ash gawked at him for a few seconds, listening to the scraping of his fingers against the canvas before resigning himself to his fate.

Fuck. He’d been hoping to impress Eiji with a nice painting made just for him, maybe one of his bicycle or of the ecosystem sitting in his living room, but God, that’d be too complicated and intricate even if Ash knew how to paint properly with his hands.

No, he had to stick to something simple. Something that wouldn’t look like a shapeless blob once he was done with it.

Flowers, he decided. Flowers were easy to do, and they’d look pretty too.

Ash noticed then that Eiji was not using any of the black or the pink, so he settled on painting black pearl roses in a vase.

He still had the one Eiji had put in his hair the first time they’d hung out.

It was pressed between the pages of one of his weightier textbooks. At first, it’d seemed too beautiful to throw away; now it bore the memory of Eiji touching his hair like he was a precious flower.

Ash smiled to himself as he set about fashioning the vase, opting to have it sit on a table. It was a struggle to get the colour to go where he wanted; the dyes were quite runny and didn’t co-operate with his fumbling fingers. But he was nothing if not persistent, and in the comfortable hush that had fallen upon them, he managed to paint a decent vase.

Then he began to work on the flowers themselves, and all hell suddenly broke loose.

The stems came out too fat. The dye-stained heel of his palm left random blotches wherever it accidently made contact with the canvas. And worst of all, he couldn’t get the petals even.

“Son of a bitch!”

Ash slammed down his little bowl of dye on the work-stool next to his easel, and Eiji met his eyes over the top of his own painting, his half-smile like a touch of moonlight. “Trouble in paradise?”

“No,” Ash harrumphed to keep his pride, holding his wet hands away from his body and tossing his head lightly to get a particularly annoying strand of hair out of his eyes. “This just—I don’t know how to—ugh, flowers suck.”

“Alright, alright, there’s no need for blasphemy,” Eiji snickered, wiping off his hands on a spare rag and coming over to his side. “What are you trying to do; maybe I can help.”

Ash drew his attention morosely to his three sorry attempts at making the roses. “Well, I’m leaving smudges everywhere, everything’s too boxy; I wanted dainty curves, but I can’t get the angle right, and these colours here aren’t blended enough, also how do you even attempt thorns—”

“Okay, time out,” Eiji cut in soothingly, hip-checking him. “One thing at a time.”

He picked up the untouched rag on Ash’s work-stool and took Ash by the wrist as he cleaned off the dye on his fingertips. “If the dye’s still wet on your hand, then stop and wipe it off, genius. That way you won’t get any smudges.”

Ash pouted at him. “You weren’t doing that.”

“That’s because I know how to work on details while holding my fingers away from the canvas,” Eiji deadpanned, his hand still encircling Ash’s. “Now, if you want nice curvy lines, you can’t do them with your pointer finger, you have to—”

“I wasn’t!” Ash protested. “I used my pinkie, so they’d be thinner, but—.”

Eiji gave him a firm look that meant ‘Shush,’ and Ash promptly closed his mouth. Eiji then turned his hand over to show Ash his palms and swiped his thumb over the tops of his fingers. “The pad of your pinkie isn’t that much thinner than the pad of your pointer finger. That’s why you’ve got to use the side of your thumb for curves. It’s less surface area, and your thumb is easier to control than your fingers. Here, let me show you.”

And as if Ash wasn’t feeling zaps of light in his veins already, Eiji flattened himself against his back and placed his face over Ash’s shoulder, going up on his tiptoes so he could still see the half-finished painting. One hand manoeuvred the edge of Ash’s thumb into the bowl of dye and the other rested idly on Ash’s waist.

Ash didn’t know whether to tense or give in.

Oh my God, Eiji was like a quilt, warm and cosy and soft where his hair tickled Ash’s cheek. Ash almost squeaked, but his teeth clamped down on his bottom lip before the sound escaped, and there they stayed as Eiji guided his thumb such that it hovered a centimetre away from the canvas.

“Don’t press down too hard now, or the stem will come out thick again.” The whispered instruction sent little tremors zigzagging through Ash, but Eiji’s hand was steady enough for both of them, and Ash tried his best to concentrate as his thumb made first contact with the canvas.

Evidently, he was applying too much pressure, because he felt Eiji smack his hip lightly not a second later. “Lighter, Aslan.”

He slackened his thumb a little bit, and Eiji tsked again.

“Lighter.”

“Might as well take my fucking hand off the canvas at this rate,” Ash said under his breath.

“Fine, make boxy flowers then,” Eiji groused, starting to shift away from him.

Ash felt one touch of the air of the room against his back—air that was somehow more frigid than before—and immediately twisted around to grab Eiji by his apron with his free hand.

He pulled pleadingly, a little tongue-tied. Eiji let him stew for a moment, before relenting and assuming his previous position.

“You’re a menace,” he spoke into Ash’s ear, an expresso-edge in his voice and whiskey in his eyes.

Ash smiled at him, veiled and slight, only a tad pleased with himself. “Just help.”

This time he kept his touch as light as possible as Eiji moved his thumb in a decisive arc, starting at the spot where the top of the stem would go instead of starting at the bottom, the way Ash had been doing.

“Oh, this is way better,” Ash exclaimed, taking in the elegant stem.

“Right?” Eiji said, mirroring his grin. “Now just do smaller strokes like this to outline the petals, and then fill them in.”

Ash nodded and rued the loss of Eiji against him as the latter stepped back to watch him work. Ash wiped off the green dye from his thumb and went for the black. He tried a few strokes, but each came out shakier than the last. He groaned and looked over his shoulder at Eiji.

“You’re going too slow,” Eiji critiqued patiently. “Don’t think so much; just do what feels right. Commit.”

“I can’t not think,” Ash whined. “There’ll be no going back if I do it wrong.”

Eiji laughed him off. “Just try. Turn off your big brain and see where your heart takes you.”

“My heart can’t take me anywhere; it’s a blood pump with no inherent ability to mobilize my locomotive appendages.”

“Oh, fuck you and your scientific accuracy; you know what I’m saying!”

“Ugh, fine! There, you happy?”

Ash really had meant to swipe randomly at the space above the stem. But with all his attention focused on proving Eiji wrong, he’d ended up moving his thumb in whatever way had felt the most intuitive. And sure enough, there was a fine-looking petal, just as Eiji had promised.

“What the actual fuck.”

“See?” Eiji giggled, punching him in the shoulder. “I knew you could do it.”

“Artists and their metaphors,” Ash hmphed, blowing a dislodged lock of his hair out of his eyes. “Too hard to follow.”

“Engineers and their rationales,” Eiji retorted without missing a beat, brushing said lock of hair behind his ears. “Too silly for art.”

Heaven on Earth, Ash would’ve dumped the entire bowl of dye on Eiji’s head if he didn’t look so much like a dream, if that voice of his didn’t sound so much like rain on lily pads, if even the ghost of his touch didn’t fill Ash up with molten magic.

“What did you end up making?” Ash finally asked when his painting was safely clipped to the bedframe to dry.

Eiji flipped his canvas around for Ash to see with a flourish. “Do you like? I call it ‘Stupid Engineer.’”

Ash wanted to scoff at that. He wanted to roll his eyes and stick out his tongue and tell Eiji how much of an asshole he was.

But he couldn’t. Not when that painting that Eiji had spent the last three hours on was of him.

Of the view Eiji had had of Ash as he’d worked on his own painting. Easel blocking out most of his body, one hand reaching for a dye bowl on the work stool next to him. The colours in it were all very subtle, pastels really, except the colour of his hair.

The marigold of the ceiling light spilled over his shoulders, lit up even his jeans, and his hair looked like champagne in candlelight.

Regal, precious, and yet charmingly ordinary.

“How come my face isn’t in it?”

Ash cringed internally even as he said it. God, if that was what his mush of a brain was going to come up with, he’d be better off keeping his mouth shut.

He should’ve complimented Eiji, but instead what came out was “You can see my face from there, can’t you?”

Eiji shrugged and gestured to the empty jars of dye. “I didn’t have the right green for your eyes,” he said by way of explanation. “But I will make it one day.”

“Yeah?” Ash said, sly despite the nectar coursing through him. “You think Shunichi will ever ask for that?”

“I won’t do it for Ibe-san. I’ll do it for myself.”

And shit, maybe Ash would’ve felt less intoxicated if he had chugged tequila neat. Maybe he would’ve felt less bewitched if a fae troublemaker had doused his head in pixie dust. Maybe he would’ve been less giggly, less speechless, less filled with butterflies in a world where Eiji didn’t exist.

But who the fuck wanted to live in a world like that?

Not Ash.

He liked this; the way Eiji was so gently, yet acutely addicting.

Chapter Text

Entry #5          Rainband Silver

The colour of flashbangs.

The colour of a steel-hearted universe, the colour of sparkles in the face of adversity.

The colour of lightning in a bottle, luminous smoke, lonesome, unforgiving moonlight.

The color of shimmering curtains, the colour of ancient antidotes.

The colour of the razor’s edge.

---

When Ash had agreed to hang out at Chang Dai on a Saturday night, he’d expected to claim a stretch of the counter in the kitchen and make jokes about Shorter’s cooking while an icy glass of lemonade numbed his fingertips.

Not prep a pumpkin for what he was rapidly learning was rush hour at the restaurant.

“Fuck, ow!”

Ash dropped the potato peeler in his hand onto the cutting board for the umpteenth time, clutching at his fingers. He frowned at the nick on the joint that had scraped against the counter, thanks to his misguided attempt to get the skin off the goliath vegetable faster.

“Ash ‘Lynx’ Glenreed, everybody!” Shorter cackled, eyeing him gleefully as he ducked into the kitchen to stick two more orders to the board. “A beast with a tension regulator; an absolute fool with winter squash.”

“It’s not my fault; this thing is just…demonic!” Ash defended himself, glaring at Shorter as the man wiped his hands on his apron and hefted an empty tray. “It’s being difficult on purpose.”

“It’s not capable of cognitive thought, Ash.”

“You don’t need cognitive thought to hate someone.”

“I feel like we’re drastically overlooking the fact that this is just an orange basket of seeds and flesh—”

“—or I’m right and it’s hell spawn with an impenetrable hide—”

“Dang, did it hurt your ‘fweewings’ that bad?”

“This is the tone you wanna take with me while I’m sweaty, cranky, and brandishing a knife?”

“Boys.”

Nadia emerged from the cellar behind them before Shorter could get in a word edgewise and fixed them with a stern stare. On a good day, her well-meaning grace and quiet strength reminded Ash of a sugar crystal sharp enough to cut, today she was a sugar crystal sharp enough to decapitate.

“The customer’s been waiting for fifteen minutes already; either the pumpkin’s going in the stir fry, or you both are.”

That drained the colour from their faces fast enough, and Ash’s eyes met Shorter’s in a mutual ‘Now, look what you’ve done, you imbecile.’

“It’s okay, Nadia; I’ll handle it. Give me ten minutes; one stir fry coming up!”

And despite the simmering heat of the kitchen and the sting of blood feathering out of the cut on Ash’s finger, he had to smile. They all did.

How could you not, at Eiji?

“Now this is a brother I can rely on,” Nadia said, giving Eiji’s shoulder a grateful squeeze as she left the kitchen to mind the bar. She stared down Ash and Shorter scornfully. “Learn something.”

Shorter yelped dramatically. “Uncalled for!”

“Hear, hear,” Ash added on, though he knew the ire was futile. Eiji was already putting three orders of lemonade on Shorter’s tray and hassling him out to the customers, before making his way over to Ash.

One tiny leaf in his tousled hair, a reminder of the wind and the bicycle ride here and the way he shook his bangs out of his eyes when he was cutting onions.

Adorable.

Oversized tank top, with one strap slipping off his shoulder, his apron’s fastening covering the cute little mole on his collarbone.

Blasphemy.

“Alright, walk me through it; what’s wrong?”

Orange liqueur voice in Ash’s ears; amused, scolding.

Sucker-punch.

“This pumpkin won’t peel.” It was difficult not to pout when Eiji was looking at him like that.

Eiji raised a brow. “It won’t peel, or you can’t peel it?”

“Does your help always come with sass? ‘Cause it’s starting to get on my last damn nerve,” Ash grumbled, rolling his eyes.

Eiji simply flicked the tip of his nose and giggled. “Liar.”

Ash blushed and turned away. Guilty as charged.

Eiji’s voice always got real low and smooth when he teased. It was like a switch flipping: strawberry soda to warm caramel.

Honestly, sometimes Ash needled him just to hear the way his voice shifted.

Lucky for him though, Eiji always knew when to drop it. He never pushed too far, never left Ash to struggle by himself, even for ‘the sheer comedy of it all’, as Shorter put it.

“Just cut it into sixths and chuck it in the microwave for a bit,” he told Ash now. “That will make the skin soft enough for you to pull it off with your hands. No peeler required.”

“Shit, why didn’t I think of that?” Ash muttered, the light of dawn shining in his eyes.

Eiji shrugged, brushing enough hair out of Ash’s face for him to knock on Ash’s temple with one finger. “Because your big brain is for giant flying machines. My brain, is for—”

For what?

For short-circuiting Ash? For filling him with bubbles and rose petals? For detonating fireworks at every spot their skin touched?

“For handling hell spawn with an impenetrable hide.”

Ash snorted. “You heard that? From all the way over by the water cooler?”

Eiji smiled, like the insinuation otherwise was ridiculous. “I’m always listening to you, Aslan.” He reached further down the counter to grab a chilled glass of lemonade and held it out to Ash. “Now quick, finish with that pumpkin and go outside to cool off. You’re starting to look like a boiled lobster.”

Ash hip-checked him and told him to shut the fuck up; brushed fingertips with him as he took the glass and told him thank you. Both with a grin on his face, a grin that would not go away no matter what he did.

It was difficult to be embarrassed around Eiji for long; Ash was less flustered now than he used to be.

Eiji was safe in that way. Safe to be incompetent around, safe to be soft in front of, safe to be…

Just be. No armour.

And how ironic, how…how terrifying, that the gradual lifting of this burden would be the thing that felt like sinking to Ash.

But was it a dark uncertain sea he was sinking into, or was it a snuggly, fluffy duvet?

In all seriousness, Ash didn’t know.

He’d never felt this way before; hadn’t known this type of high.

Oh well. It was a dilemma for another night. For now, there was the memory of Eiji’s fingers in his bangs, and lemonade.

Ash sauntered out of the kitchen as soon as the pumpkin was diced and cooking in the stir fry, sighing contentedly as the relatively cooler atmosphere of the restaurant space wrapped around him. The clamour of customers had now reduced; there were only a few other people apart from Max, Jess, Shunichi, and Charlie, who pored over a host of files scattered over the bar top. Ash guessed they were still trying to figure out the identity of the mysterious man Arthur had met up with, and decided to give them a wide berth. He knew what he had seen was important somehow, but he wasn’t ready for any gruesome details right now.

Especially not with Eiji and Shorter within earshot.

Instead, Ash made a beeline for the corner booth occupied by Sing and Michael. Sing had somehow gotten a hold of an old menu and was currently showing Michael how to fold it into various paper plane designs. The incandescent wonder on both their faces warmed Ash’s heart in a way that was comfortable despite the sweltering heat.

“Now this next one, Mikey, is called The Vulture,” Sing proclaimed, nodding to Ash as he pulled up a chair to their little worktable.

“The Vulture!” Michael chirped. “What does it do?”

“This plane’s secret weapon is its speed. When we’re done folding it, it’ll only be a little guy next to the Dart or the Raven, but it’ll fly way faster. This design is the closest to what the Aviation department’s planes look like.”

“Wow.” Michael was watching carefully as Sing’s fingers made the folds, but he peeked up at Ash for a moment. “So do the planes you work on look like this, Ash?”

Ash waited for the basic form of the machine to emerge from the paper, and then hummed his affirmation. It was a little bit marvellous, the ease with which Sing was able to pull the elegant arrowhead shape of the machine out of a rectangle, and Ash got the feeling that Sing spent a lot of time doing this. He could just imagine the kid, stuck in the back of his middle school classroom with the screeches of spaceplanes taking off in the distance, folding the pages of his textbooks into winged little dreams.

“So cool!” Michael gushed when the finished model of the plane sat between them. “Ash, will you take me to see the real thing sometime?”

“Sorry bud,” Ash said, ruffling his hair. “You gotta at least be in middle school to get into the building; never mind onto the runway.”

He shushed the voice in the back of his head that speculated about if they would even be here when Michael was old enough to be in middle school. He didn’t want to entertain that possibility at all, not on a nice night like this one.

Michael scowled. “Boo.”

“Boo,” Ash concurred, laughing. “But it’s better than Elysium, isn’t it?”

Michael nodded begrudgingly, but Sing threw Ash a dubious glance. “It is?”

“Uh-huh,” Michael spoke for him, his smile small and sad. “There’s no paper in Elysium. Only holo-tech. And JoJo the Friendly Space Drifter never said anything about folding planes. Or Earth. I don’t like JoJo that much anymore. I thought that they knew everything, but they don’t. You’re way better than them, Sing. You and Shorter and Eiji and Miss Nadia and everybody here.”

“Huh. Imagine that.”

Ash didn’t miss the strange look on Sing’s face. There was this odd sense of grief there; an odd sense of pride too, mixed in with his confusion. Ash knew full well why Earth still had paper to make paper planes out of; the colonies had been hoarding electronic resources for decades, especially for their tracking U-Watches, so the Earth settlements had to kiss their own graduation into the holo-tech era goodbye. Hell, even the Telecom branch of Mecha didn’t bother with it too much; no matter what they did, holo-tech was never going to be commercialized for Earth anyway.

And Ash had no doubt Sing had wished for holo-tech in the same way him and Michael had wished for paper.

Not necessarily wanting what they couldn’t have, but wanting choice, wanting variety.

It occurred to Ash then that it wasn’t about the grass being greener on the other side, but about wanting not just grass, but water and air and soil too.

Thud!

The smack of the rickety restaurant door against the wall and the jangling of the blinds over it.

It was the first of the horrid noises that were going to rip through that sleepy evening, but Ash didn’t know it in the moment.  

He looked to the door like everybody else, but his turn was annoyed more than anything else, his movements lazy.

Until he saw who had come scurrying in.

Until he noted the angular severity of the man’s face, at the way his eyes darted this way and that, methodical even in their agitated scanning before they landed on Charlie. At the grey roots of his hair that ended in faded auburn tips, at the almost condescendingly intelligent countenance.

All of which he had in common with the mystery man from the power plant.

And didn’t it stand to reason, therefore, that if they had all this in common, that they would have their last name in common as well?

Dawson.

The man before him now was Professor Alexis Dawson of Mecha. The question was, who was the other?

“Max!” Ash called for him sharply, and when he turned to look over startled, Ash beckoned him to their table and away from the bar against which Dawson had practically collapsed.

Max shook his head ‘not right now’, even as Jess hastily swept the files they’d been looking at into a pile and Shunichi leaned over them to cover them as inconspicuously as he could. But Ash could not wait, not when Dawson looked half-delirious with fright, his face bruised and his body wobbling with the weight of unseen wounds.

No, something had happened, and Max needed to corner this man and join the dots right the fuck now. It might be their only chance.

“Max,” Ash called again.

Max glared at him this time, as Dawson began babbling incoherently about something to Charlie. Ash saw the look he cast towards Michael and Sing, who were both watching the spectacle unfolding before them with some interest. Evidently, he did not want to do this in front of them, so Ash got to his feet and slunk off to stand near the far wall of the restaurant. It was only then that Max excused himself from the bar and came his way.

“What’s the big idea, punk?” Max hissed, looking between Ash and the group of frenzied adults that Nadia was actively trying to quieten. “Your professor was just telling Charlie about how someone attacked him at his office and here you are—”

“Max, it’s him,” Ash cut in urgently, his gaze flicking to Dawson for a second. “He knows the man Arthur was talking to at the power plant; I guarantee it.”

That got Max’s attention. “How do you figure?” he murmured, careful not to gasp and arouse suspicion.

“He looks just like that guy. Older, more haggard, and less manic, but it’s the same bone structure, the same eyes. I think they’re related, siblings, cousins, something; they look too similar not to be. I bet if you looked through Level 5 operative records for the power plant, you’ll find a Dawson listed in there. That’s gotta be your guy.”

Max stared at his feet as he processed what Ash was telling him. When he looked up at Ash again, his eyes were determined. “And you’re sure about this?”

“Yes. I knew there was something familiar about the guy the first time I saw him, but I couldn’t put my finger on what. God, I should’ve known he was some relation of Dawson’s,” Ash said, irritated with himself for missing it.

Max gave him a sympathetic pat on the back. “Hey now. This is more than enough. Thanks for the lead, kiddo.”

“What’re you whispering about, my dudes?”

Crap. When did Shorter get here? The last Ash had seen him he’d been kitchen-bound with the order of the couple at Table 4.

Well, no time to fret over what he’d heard and not heard; what mattered now was to keep their cover.

Shorter didn’t need to be involved. It was not his problem.

“Max was just asking me if I knew anything about how Dawson could’ve gotten attacked at his office at the Academy.” Ash hated how easily the lie rolled off his tongue.

Shorter’s gaze darted between them, and Max added on swiftly. “Uh, yeah, figured I’d check, you know, since you guys are in the building all the time.”

A look of understanding passed over Shorter’s face, and Ash exhaled in relief. He’d bought it.

“I get you. What the fuck, though? Why would anyone attack him?” Shorter mused aloud. “He’s awful quiet, never does anything to anybody, right Ash? I mean, he teaches that boring nanotech stuff to the chemical engineering people, and maybe that’s a crime, but—shit, I doubt it’s something to fuck him up over.”

“That’s what I’m saying,” Ash seconded, regarding Max gravely, “He’s got a weirdly high opinion of the Combat branch, but he’s clean otherwise. There’s not a lot of reason to go after him, unless—”

Bang!

This noise was a lot louder than the door slam not ten minutes ago.

And it came saturated with the crackle and pop of fire, with the scream of tearing metal, with the dissonant shattering of glass as half a mangled car door crashed against one of the windows of Chang Dai and spilled the cacophony of sound, heat, and hazard into what was supposed to be a low-key night.

“My car!” Dawson shrieked.  

Everything happened very quickly after that.

Michael began to cry, and Jess rushed over to gather him in her arms. Shunichi popped open the back door of the restaurant and herded the terrified straggling customers out. Charlie wrapped a deathly grip around Dawson’s wrist, and Ash caught in his periphery his first glimpse of a gun outside Floor Nine of the Mecha building. Nadia disappeared somewhere into the back of the restaurant and came out with a bunch of hockey sticks. They were old, but not unused. One was tossed to Shorter. The entire exchange was wordless, seething with anger and all too practiced for something like this to have happened for the first time. The second hockey stick Nadia kept for herself, and the last one went to Ash, who snatched it fluidly from the air.

Shorter and Max ran straight for the door, and Ash wanted to go with them, to channel his indignation into discovering what the fuck had just happened, but his heart pulled him towards the kitchen first. Because the small shaking part of him had fishhooks raking over his chest, and the torturous thought of Eiji, disoriented, afraid, rushing out into the commotion to see what had gone wrong only to—Oh, God, Ash couldn’t stand it.

He simply had to make sure. Before he did anything else, he simply had to make sure Eiji was okay.

Eiji was bursting through the kitchen doors when Ash got to him, unarmed despite it all, and Ash shoved him back into the tentative sanctuary of that room before he could get any further.

“Are you alright?!” they asked each other in frantic chorus. Eiji’s eyes searched his, blown wide and glazed with fear. Ash nearly froze, a little unravelled by the way that gaze seemed to reach for him, like there was no one else to lean on.

“I’m fine,” he managed to croak. Eiji however did not provide any manner of answer other than a sigh that sounded like he was starting to breathe again after a terrible dearth of air.

“What happened? I heard a crash, and—and screaming—”

“Nothing,” Ash said, reflexive to the point of ridiculousness, trying to keep Eiji from the carnage of it all, even though he knew it was futile at this point.

Eiji looked like he wanted to laugh in his face for saying that but was too on edge to do so. “Aslan.”

“Okay, so a car exploded outside the restaurant, and I think Shorter’s going to beat somebody’s ass.”

As if on cue, a shout laced with livid laughter rang out. “Arthur, you—you pathetic fucking—oh, you picked the right one, motherfucker!”

Ash winced and Eiji slumped in on himself, fingers pressed to his forehead. “Correction,” Ash spat, venomous now. “Shorter’s going to beat Arthur’s ass.”

“Beat his ass? He’ll be lucky if I don’t eat him alive,” Shorter cut in, his voice like a shard of ice as he approached them both. Ash had barely seen him without the shielding dark shutter of his sunglasses; he even wore them indoors and at night, but never had he looked this dead behind the eyes.

“Here, hold this,” Shorter said, giving a thrashing, protesting Sing to Eiji, who wrapped two strong arms around him without question. “Fucking Arthur. Destroys our property and then has the gall to flip me off while he rides away on Sing’s old bike; I swear, this is the last time that asshole messes with my family.”

“Take me with you; I can help!” Sing tried one last time. “I want to help!”

“No,” Shorter said, unmoving. “You keep your butt right here, fucking safe and away from this mess.”

Funny how he took the words right out of Ash’s mouth there, only Ash wouldn’t have said it quite so strict. He glanced at Eiji then, and watched his expression wilt with the realization that Ash was begging him to do the same.

“We’ll be here,” Eiji said quietly, holding an angry Sing a little closer to him. “Provided you come back in one piece, and don’t do anything stupid.”

Promising nods were exchanged, and the next thing Ash knew, he was following Shorter and Max past the open door of Chang Dai and into the crisp night air. They reeled as the brightness of the flames hit them full force, hot enough to melt the skin off their bones. Somewhere among them sat the wreckage of the car, leaning forlornly on one side like a desolate beast. Stumbling away from the disfigured metal hunk, him and Shorter went straight for Shorter’s bike, which was parked down the street, even as Max split off to placate the scared neighbours.

There were no sirens in the distance, no real alarms going off, and it unsettled Ash thoroughly to kick up as much noise as they were into the otherwise silent night.

“Where’s the fucking fire department?” Ash asked, quickly parking himself on Shorter’s bicycle carrier as his friend hopped on, giving him his hockey stick to hold onto.

Shorter scoffed. “Not a big enough fire for them,” was all he said on the matter.

He picked up speed the moment they started to move. Ash deduced that Arthur had fucked with Shorter enough for the latter to know where the rodent would run off to, because Shorter was skidding into back alleys and onto main streets like he knew exactly where the guy was going. He was nowhere as fast as Eiji, obviously unaccustomed to Ash’s weight behind him, but the adrenaline was serving him well. Within a few minutes, Ash could see the purple of Arthur’s—scratch that, Sing’s stolen bike’s—reflective decals in the light from Shorter’s head lamps.

“Arthur!” Shorter yelled after him, half-hoarse. “Come at me like you mean it, damn it!”

Arthur looked over his shoulder then, and his beady eyes glinted with self-important contempt. “Not everything’s about you, Wong! Your ass is nothing but a casualty. Has been for a while, actually.”

“You wanna say that shit; you say it to my face, bitch!”

Shorter turned to Ash then, grimmer than Ash had ever seen him. “Think you can knock him off the bike if I flank him? I wanna drag this bastard into an alley and lay into him.”

Ash considered the notion, and along with it considered the trembling vitriol in Shorter’s voice, the tension in his limbs and the heft of the hockey sticks in his own hands. He considered Shorter’s suddenly all-too-real threat of eating Arthur alive, and Nadia’s quiet outrage, and Sing’s cracked voice, and Eiji’s now-monumental request to not do anything stupid. He considered the road ahead of them, the downward incline they were now approaching, the myriad potholes it was littered with, and the coarse nature of the asphalt.

He considered it all with photo-shutter speed, and then met Shorter’s eyes resolutely. “If you flank him, I’ll do you one better.”

Shorter grinned at him then, bright as a lightning crack. “Okay, brother. I trust you.”

There was a diffused triumph in Ash’s bones as the sentiment fell upon his ears, but he forced himself to tamp it down as Shorter began to pedal faster, gaining on Arthur with every passing second.

And when they came in line with him, Ash looked Arthur straight in the eye. He looked him straight in his arrogant fucking eyes and saw the fear slice through them and distort them into a dead fish’s eye. Ash felt himself think, ‘Good. Know that you fucked up. Know that you deserve this’ as he rammed one of the hockey sticks through the spokes of the front wheel of Arthur’s bike.

Everything happened very slowly after that.

The bike flipped over and threw Arthur up and off. He landed with a wet thud on one arm and somersaulted a couple of times down the incline, the uneven road cutting into him before he came to a stop. Shorter watched him collect himself in the light of a streetlight, took in the way the blood dripped from his lip, the way he clutched the arm he didn’t dare to move, the way he limped out of sight, leaving Sing’s stolen bike behind. The way he didn’t even have it in him to shout anything in response to that.

Shorter didn’t smile at the scene, but there was no remorse on his face either.

It was just neutral, like he thought this was just enough.

Shorter took a calming breath then slowly went forward to collect Sing’s bike. He left Ash with his own bike, the hockey sticks, and the silent aftermath of the idea itself.

At least Shorter didn’t accidently go overboard in a fit of righteous anger, Ash told himself. At least they dealt with it quick and clean and severe enough to get Arthur to fuck off for a while. At least they didn’t do anything truly stupid, anything that they wouldn’t have been able to come back from.

This was…this was…necessary. Justified revenge. Yes, that was what it was, nothing more.

“You’re good at this, Lynx,” Shorter chuckled, clapping him on the back as they walked back to Chang Dai, wheeling the two bikes along.

Ash felt a little nauseous, but he smiled back like he knew Shorter wanted him to.

No, he was not good at this. He just knew a lot about machines.

That was all. Applied knowledge used to make the bike do what he wanted, yes.

He was…he was not good at…at violence.

He wasn’t. He wasn’t.

---

The breeze had been just a bit too nippy and just a smidge too strong when Ash had gone to bed.

He remembered because he’d told Michael to cover half of the window in their room with the tarp, just as they’d started to get ready to go to sleep. He almost hadn’t, in favour of sucking it up and sleeping in more clothes than just a T-shirt and shorts, but laziness had won out in the end, and he’d made sure the window was at least somewhat closed before getting under the covers.

And boy, was Ash glad now that he had.

Michael would’ve gotten hit in the fucking face with a shard of road sign if he hadn’t.

Ash had been squirming in his sparse blanket for a while, his drowsiness enough to keep his eyes closed, but his body too soaked with chill to actually fall asleep. Unending minutes of tossing and turning, debating with himself if he should get off his damn ass and tarp up that entire window already, and then Michael’s voice had ripped open a wound in the night.

High, sharp, petrified. “Ash, Ash help!”

Ash’s eyes had flown open instantly, all of a sudden aware that it was entirely too bright to be night-time.

The lightning shattering the sky was that powerful.

And in the near-white snapshot of light Ash had seen the distorted grey ruthlessness of the cloudy world outside them, the almost opaque curtain of rain, and the menacing rectangle of metal that was currently lodged in the helpless tarp, flapping in the eerie whistling winds, a mere foot from Michael’s fear-seized form.

Then the thunder emerged from the deluge like a primal war drum, and visceral horror squeezed Ash’s body like a boa constrictor.

He swung his legs off the bed and yelled, “On the floor, Mikey! Get on the floor and under the bed, now!”

Michael promptly threw himself off the mattress, but he landed awkward and hard on his knees as his feet tangled in his blanket.

“It’s okay, buddy! You’re gonna be okay!” Ash assured when he squealed in pain, suddenly having to compete with the gusts of wind to be heard. They swirled around the little room and slowly, disturbingly, began to shift their dressers, but Ash ignored them, he had to, if he was going to get to Michael without the fright shutting down his system.

“Ash, I’m scared!”

“I know, bud! Just hang on; I’m going to come get you!”

Ash stumbled forward but was quickly forced back by a flying piece of roof that rammed into the tarp, and took the whole thing clean off the window. It hurtled into the door and rattled its hinges like a ghost’s chains. Both him and Michael scrambled away from it just in time, but now they were even further away from each other than before.

From elsewhere in the house, a series of crashes sounded, accompanied by frantic thudding, and Jessica’s raw voice came to them from all too far away.

“Boys! Boys, are you alright?!”

“Mommy! Mommy, we’re here!” Michael sobbed, and Ash’s bones got hollower than they’d been two minutes ago.

He heard the faint clicking of the door opposite theirs opening above the hammering of the rain and yelled back straightaway. “We’re alive! Don’t come in here; our window’s wide fucking open and there’s stuff flying in!”

“Ash!” This was Max now, and he sounded wrecked. “Ash, stay with Michael! I’m coming in there!”

“No, for fuck’s sake you’ll just get hurt! We’ll get out and come to you; would you just—let me think; I need to think!”

Ash gulped down air, his heart thundering in his chest louder than whatever monster was growling in the sky, hoping that if he just pumped enough oxygen into his bloodstream then it would refocus his helter-skeltering brain.

His eyes went to Michael, who was staring outside the window in morbid fascination as the lightning illuminated the sky once more, and Ash spotted with a sinking stomach, a vague funnel of cloud that looked like it definitely did not belong in a merciful sky.

Oh, dear God.

“Mikey!” he called, and Michael’s eyes snapped to him, glittering with tears. “Stay against the wall! I’m gonna crawl to you. Don’t move, no matter what, okay?”

“Okay!” Michael replied, pressing himself back as the winds buffeted his face.

Ash lowered himself flat on his stomach, his eyes fixed on the window now, straining to see any incoming projectiles amongst the shadows. Without the lightning, the world seemed strangled in dark mist, but he started forward as fast as he dared just the same.

He cried out in surprise and instinctually covered his head with his hands as something else whooshed by above him and slammed into the doorframe, bouncing off and clattering to the floor. Swivelling his head to the left Ash saw that it was a heavy-duty wrench, not even an arm’s length from him, and that was when his treacherous body began to tremble.

Ash swore loud enough to wake the dead, and yet from the look on Michael’s face, he hadn’t heard him at all.

Ash wished he had. Maybe then he could’ve convinced himself that the winds weren’t as bad as he’d thought they were.

But the universe allowed him no such consolation.

The winds were swallowing his voice, the rain was drinking up his frustrations, and there was another bang and a whistling gale somewhere in the back of Ash’s awareness, and he knew if he didn’t get to Michael in the next thirty seconds the storm would make a meal of them too. But God, his stupid, frail fucking body was refusing to move, because there was too much adrenaline flooding his veins, too many worst-case-scenarios and traumatizing what-ifs dancing around in his head, oh, if he could just stop shaking, why was he still shaking, Michael needed him, he needed to—

Ash jolted like a live wire as a persistent knocking shook the door to their room, and a voice clear as an alarm bell rang out.

“Heads up; I’m coming in!”

The very sound made Ash choke on his own breath.

The panic arresting him was too great to howl; it was too great to move; it was too great to even look.

But Ash didn’t need to look to recognize the voice reaching for him; he didn’t need to look to recognize the hands that pulled his dead weight to his knees and propelled him towards Michael.

Because even in a tempest, Eiji found a way to part the clouds, decisive and gentle.

Like sunshine bleeding through black cellophane, a backpack slung over one shoulder and a motorcycle helmet encasing most of his face, running straight for the open window with a new, much stronger looking trap stretched between his hands.

“Out, out, quickly!” he instructed, holding down the corners of the tarp to cover the yawning window as Ash scooped Michael into his arms and braced a hand over his head. “Take the duffel bag in the hallway, go to your parents’ room, and close the door! Careful now, the tarp on the living room window won’t hold for long!”

Ash’s blood hardened to ice. No way was he leaving Eiji behind in this vortex of entropy. But Michael was clinging to him, near hysterical, and—

“You come too!” Ash pleaded, staggering to his feet, and making for the door.

Eiji just shook his head vehemently. “Have to shore up the house first!”

Ash blanched as something from the outside thwacked onto the middle of the tarp and bounced back into the winds, socking Eiji in the stomach in the process.

“Eiji!”

A shudder went through his body, but Eiji held his place, keeping the window as closed as he could.

“Go, please!” he coughed. “I cannot start sealing this window if you do not go!”

“But—”

“Aslan, you have to trust me on this!”

And honestly, fuck Eiji for smiling at him then. Who the fuck smiled at people in the midst of a violent storm?

Feather-soft. Switchblade brave. Terror twisted into hope.

“Trust me. I’m right behind you, okay?”

God, what was Ash meant to do in the face of that smile, that lighthouse in the centre of defencelessness and pandemonium?

Listen, apparently.

An agonized scream tore itself out of Ash’s throat, but he turned his back on Eiji and darted out of the room, flattening himself against the hallway wall immediately. Holding Michael with one hand now, he grabbed the promised duffel with the other and tottered on his feet as the dark and the winds pistol-whipped his sense of direction. He gave himself a couple of seconds to look both ways for projectiles just in case, and then launched himself at Max and Jess’ door, bearing down on the door handle with his elbow as he went.

Ash tumbled into the room in a discombobulated heap, Michael on his chest and the duffel somewhere near his feet. He heard the door clicking shut behind him, and Jess’ distraught voice in his ears, but he couldn’t bring himself to open his eyes. The wails of the storm were deadened some in this room, but Ash could not stop them from ricocheting around in his head. Before the peril had kept his senses focused on survival, but he was feeling everything now.

The wetness of the rain-sodden winds sticking his hair to his face, the prickle of frost where his skin was exposed and the deathly grasp of it where he was clothed, the throbbing in his muscles from all the hanging-on-for-dear-life.

“Ash? Ash, kiddo; are you okay? Say something.”

Ash rubbed his eyes and peeked out through one of them. Max was leaning over him, his gaze none-too-subtly checking him for injuries.  

“I’m fine,” he groaned, trying to adjust Michael so that he could sit up. Jess noticed him struggling, and quickly lifted the child off him, giving him some space to breathe and Michael someone else to hold onto. “I think Mikey scraped his knee though.”

“Is that true, sweetie?” Jess asked Michael, sitting down on the bed, and cradling him. “Can Mommy look at it?”

Michael merely squeaked in response. He wasn’t actively crying anymore, but the tears were still trickling down his cheeks, and he looked like he was too drained to engage with anything right now.

“It’s okay, bud; we can look at it later,” Max soothed, patting him on the back. “You did so good. You’re a very brave boy.” He looked to Ash, sombre for once and very overwhelmed. “You both are. We’re so proud of you.”

Ash’s lungs pushed out a disagreeing wheeze. “Shut up. Eiji did more than I did.”

“You shut up, brat,” Jess retorted without missing a beat, even as Michael yanked him into a hug.  “You tried your best to keep all of us safe. That is more than enough.”

Ash couldn’t help a garbled laugh. He supposed there was little else that made it through his thick emotional skull other than Jessica’s tough love.

He flopped back onto the floor the moment Michael felt inclined to let him go, pushing his forehead against the ground as if that would somehow numb the anxieties bouncing around in his brain.

Eiji was still out there.

The rain had created a wall of constant percussion, but Ash could hear it all loud and clear. There was more thudding coming from behind the door, more clunking sounds, and jarring clicks. Clearly, there was so much that needed doing, and Eiji was doing it all alone, in God only knew how much danger, and here he was, cocooned away safely like he fucking deserved it over Eiji.

Max had tried to help, reminding him, “Eiji knows what he’s doing. This kind of thing is exactly what he trains for.”

But it was cold comfort to Ash; he’d merely shrunk in on himself and ignored the platitude. Hell, he would’ve gone back out already, if those words hadn’t continued to echo inside him.

If Eiji had not asked, with everything he had, for Ash to trust him.

So, there Ash had stayed, sprawled on the ground like a deflated balloon for what felt like far too long.

Until there was air to breathe once more.

It rushed in with Eiji, just a small gust as he swiftly ducked into the room and locked the door behind him.

He pulled the helmet off his head and set it down quietly on the floor, panting as he did so. He was completely drenched, water running in rivulets down his arms and dripping from the tips of his bangs onto his nose. Sniffling, his backpack joined the helmet on the floor as Max went up to him, shaking him by the shoulders just a little as he grinned, relieved.

“How’s it looking?” Max was asking. “What are we in for here?”

Not that Ash cared very much in this moment.

Questions could be asked later. Strategizing could be done later.

But right now, Eiji was alive and well, despite it all, lopsided smile and all, last twinkle of quartz in a murky universe, last gasp of melody in all the dissonance.

Ash practically flew into his arms; Eiji had opened them on reflex. And as rain-heavy as Ash was, he started to lighten; his body began to thaw, shivering as he pressed the nose he could barely feel into Eiji’s neck, just next to his pulse.

Distantly, he was cognizant of Max’s bemused laughter, but he simply couldn’t find the wherewithal to budge. This was important, vital, even. 

How fast Eiji’s heart was beating; what a lullaby it was. How tightly his arms were wrapped around Ash’s waist, what a lifeline Ash felt like in his embrace. How sweetly he breathed, “Thank you for trusting me.”

What a shockwave that sent rippling through Ash.

Eiji resumed talking with Max after the man cleared his throat pointedly, but Ash didn’t feel bereft for a second. There was the calming sweep of Eiji’s palms on the small of his back, the delicate sway of their bodies as Eiji rocked them from side to side, and that soft, soft voice by his ears, balm on a bruise and optimistic in spite of everything.

“Hurricane is my best guess, since it kicked up a tornado,” Eiji was saying. “It’s made landfall now though, so it will pass us soon.”

“How soon?”

“It…it is hard to say for sure. Based on Wolfsbane records, it should lift in one to two days.”

“Holy fucking shit.”

“It will be okay, Max. The windows are sealed with special tarp for hurricanes, all the big furniture is secured, and I tripped the main breaker and unplugged everything so that we will not have electric fires. All we have to do now is stay here and wait.”

“What about water, snacks, blankets? There’s five of us in here.”

“All in the duffel bag.”

“And lights? Michael would probably feel better if we could—”

“Flashlights are in the duffel. I also have books, and games, and a couple of spare T-shirts, if he wants to change into something dry.”

“How about a Band-Aid? I think he skinned his knee.”

“Front pocket of my backpack.”

“Great. Awesome. Wow, we owe you one, kid; yeesh, I don’t know what would’ve happened if—Oh, fuck, we should call Shunichi and Nadia! Make sure they’re okay.”

“Already texted them on my way down; they’re all good. Homes sealed and stocked up. Thank God they fixed up the Chang Dai window last week, otherwise we’d have had a real problem.”

“Woah,” Ash drawled into Eiji’s hair. “So, you’re like…cool, huh?”

“Hush,” Eiji mumbled, a smile in his voice, gently knocking his forehead against the side of Ash’s head.

Max for some reason remained unconvinced of said obvious coolness, because he went on, “Okay, but do you think they should—”

“God, Max, give it a rest; he’s tired!” Ash whined, finally taking his face out of the crook of Eiji’s neck just to glare at him.

Max looked extremely unimpressed. “If he’s so tired, maybe you should consider getting off him, you limpet.”

Ash balked, chastised as intended.

He hadn’t considered that; Eiji probably wanted some space to catch his breath and reorganize his thoughts, perhaps change too. Yeah, maybe he should—no, he should definitely get off Eiji, he was probably getting uncomfortable now; this was…they were so close, and in front of his family no less—

“Ah no, that’s okay!”

Eiji pulled him closer just as he started to disentangle himself, and Ash peeked down at him, a little dumbfounded.

Eiji smiled back, like the first taste of plums under a bittersweet sunset. “He doesn’t have to get off if he doesn’t want to. If anything, he’s helping.”

---

Ash didn’t fall asleep for a long time.

Michael and Jess conked off first, too exhausted from crying and worrying, and Max only got through 20 pages of Eiji’s botany book in the glare of a flashlight before nodding off.

But Ash, no, he couldn’t sleep.

Not just yet.

He sat huddled in a blanket nest on the floor, propped up against the side of the bed. One of Max’s button-ups hung off his frame; he was dry now, but the chill from the rain had burrowed into his bones, and he couldn’t stop quaking.

Good thing Eiji was here.  

Ash lowered his head to rest on Eiji’s shoulders, his stuttering breaths settling their rhythm as Eiji wrapped one arm around his waist and used the other to tuck the blanket draped over their shoulders under Ash’s chin.

“Sorry,” he whispered, his lips inches from the tip of Ash’s nose, his warm palm infusing life back into Ash as he rubbed his forearm.

Ash smacked his chest lightly with the back of his hand. “Dummy. The cold isn’t your fault.”

Eiji’s eyes sparkled, secret stars in the muddled dark. “I’m still sorry.”

“I know.”

They had enough blankets for them to each have their own, but this was better, their legs tangled together under one, their sides flush against each other, swaddled in warmth that was only theirs to share.

Without the furious pattering of the downpour ringing in Ash’s ears, butterflies might’ve danced their honey-drunk dance within his chest at this prospect, but as things stood, the butterflies were plastered to his ribs, their wings slick with rain and fading dread.

But Ash didn’t mind. Being with Eiji was butterflies and bike races and exhilaration, yes; it was magic and mischief and intensity, yes, but it was also mint tea on the windowsill and afternoons doing homework together.

It was harbour on the horizon, a constant in the chaos.

Respite; restoration; reassurance.

Yes, Ash was content to drift by Eiji’s side, content to swim in and out of coherence and leave it all to Eiji.

Because Eiji was safe.

Yes, he was safe and sweet and strong, and he held Ash so soft and sure and stubborn, like he would surrender anything to the cruel whims of the universe, but not Ash.

Never Ash.

“Why didn’t we know?” Ash asked, morose. “Why didn’t anyone warn us that this was going to happen?”

Eiji pointed limply to the sky, and Ash was already revolted at the implication. “Every meteorological satellite that an Earth settlement has managed to send up has been hijacked by the colonies and stripped for parts. We don’t have the materials to spare anymore, trying to set up predictive technology that will just be stolen in six months anyway. So, we just…do the best we can when these things happen now.”

“That’s…God, that’s fucked.”

“Yes. It is.”

“How many?” Ash inquired, staring absently at the wall in front of them.

“Hm?’

“How many hurricanes have you been through?”

Eiji sucked in a sharp breath and laughed, nearly inaudible, and a little self-conscious. “Ah, this is my first.”

What.

What the fuck.

Ash’s eyes clamped shut, and he felt a tear squeeze out. His voice was shredded when he spoke, “How were you not fucking terrified; running into our room like that?”

Eiji looked at him like he’d just grown a second head. “Of course, I was terrified. I still am, a little. But you override that. As long as you’re okay, and your family is okay, nothing else matters. I didn’t even think when I ran into your room.”

“Well, next time think,” Ash frowned, petulant now because he could be; because the worst hadn’t happened to any of them. “Don’t get yourself hurt on our account. Especially mine.”

His tone was warning; his gaze deadly serious, and yet Eiji had the gall to laugh him off.

“You can take that idea and shove it up your ass, Aslan.” He booped Ash’s nose, and Ash batted away his hand. “You’re always going to be my override. I’d do anything for you.”

Ash gaped at him, and Eiji’s eyes met him head-on, tenacity and tenderness and all things untouched by the balances and metrics of a leeching world.

The nerve of this boy. The absolute fucking nerve of this beautiful, fearless boy to hold Ash this close and say that to him like it wasn’t going to punch him in the face and kiss him on the mouth and rock his entire world.

If he kept this shit up, Ash was going to have to start calling him Hurricane Eiji. He buried his face in Eiji’s shoulder.

“Fuck you, Eiji.”

It came out as nothing more than a childish grumble, and when Eiji smiled at that snow-piercing-wildflower smile at him, Ash realized that he’d stopped shaking a long time ago.

The world wasn’t cold anymore.

“You should try and get some sleep,” Eiji cooed to him. “I know it’s been a lot.”

“Don’t wanna.” Ash found the strength to look at him once more; found the strength to smile, just for him. “This is fun.”

That got Eiji to guffaw most unflatteringly. Still cute though, 10/10 as far as Ash was concerned. Yes, very cute.

“This what?”

Ash gestured vaguely. “This. Talking. Just…with you.”

Eiji took a decisive breath and focused his attention on Ash, comically deliberate. “What do you want to talk about?”

“How are your plants? Your paintings?”

Ash felt Eiji sag a little but could not bring himself to regret the questions. Instead, he patted Eiji’s hand where it rested against his waist, pleased when Eiji’s fingers intertwined with his own in response.

“More than half of my plants will die,” Eiji said, resigned. “They got too battered by the winds and the rain before I was able to seal that window. But it’s okay. I have seeds harvested. I can always grow more. The paintings are mostly fine. The window in that room is small and they are relatively fixed in place so…”

“I’m glad. I like your paintings. Getting those bedframes to clip them onto for drying was a great idea.”

And there was something about that, that made Eiji chuckle mirthlessly. It sounded so lonely, like air whistling through a cracked pot, that it made Ash lurch off Eiji’s shoulder, just so that he could look right in Eiji’s face.

He didn’t need know what was swimming in his eyes; all he knew was that if Eiji was making that kind of sound about something, then Ash wanted to find that hurt and uproot it and fling it so far away from Eiji that it would never find him again.

A wisp of a smile glimmered on Eiji’s face, a shadow of an old life. “I didn’t get those bedframes for the paintings. I repurposed them after…after my parents and my sister were no longer around to use them.”

Ash felt his insides turn to granite. He would not ask what happened to them. He could not even conceive of implying that kind of tragedy onto Eiji’s life, even in ignorance.

“Where are they now?” he asked instead.

Eiji glanced at him then, and he looked…fond. “See, that’s the funny part. I didn’t used to know, before. But I do now, because of you.”

To say Ash was puzzled would be an understatement. “I—huh?”

“When I was in my last year of middle school, both me and my sister were chosen by the Academy for possible space immigration,” Eiji explained quietly. “We were really good with plants, and the colony scholarship programs were willing to support us if we came to work in crop cultivation. But they made it clear that it could only be the two of us. We were expected to leave our parents on Earth. Everyone thought it was a good deal; even our parents encouraged us to take it, but—”

“You didn’t want to leave here,” Ash finished for him, stunned.

“I could never leave here. This is my home,” Eiji said without hesitation. “And my father, he—he was sick. Hospitals here do not waste resources on terminal diseases like liver cancer, so it was only a matter of time before…And then what, my mother would be here alone? Getting older every day, no children to rely on when things inevitably got worse? No, it seemed like such a stupid idea to me. So, I made a deal. I enrolled in Vitae for high school and convinced the Academy to give my spot to my mother. She immigrated to space with my sister, and I stayed here with my father.”

A father that there was no trace of in Eiji’s apartment now.

The more Ash thought about it, the more it dawned on him how empty that place would be, without those plants and that room full of paintings.

How empty it would feel regardless of them when Eiji was by himself.

He gulped. His stomach was starting to twist itself into a balloon animal. “Do you…” he rasped, “do you get to talk to them at all? Your mom and your sister?”

“Sometimes. We send as many letters as we can afford,” Eiji replied, melancholy. “The space colony leadership doesn’t want the Earth settlements to get any quote, ideas, so they barely tell us anything. All I was given when they left was a code number and a spiel about how it was an awesome place that produced the greater majority of food crops. I was in the dark for so long; I was so afraid that they were not living a good life. And then you came along, and told me about a place called Eden, and I finally put two and two together. I finally felt better.”

Ash sunk his face into his folded knees, shy and just a little bit sheepish, and Eiji giggled, pinching one of his cheeks. And Ash let him, because his eyes burned with something precious and forbidden, like the embers of an immortal celestial hearth, and they were intent on Ash.

“My awesome textbook, Aslan. My light in the dark, Aslan.”

God. Fuck. Hurricane Eiji, indeed.

“Nope. You’re done. That’s enough out of you. Shut up, Eiji. Like, actually shut up.”

Ash melted against him, nearly dislodging the blanket from their shoulders in his haste, and Eiji laughed, a symphony of citrus and spring in the dismal pouring rain.

“I thought you wanted to talk,” he smirked, and Ash swatted at him, choosing not to dignify that comment with a response.

His head was back on Eiji’s shoulder now, and Eiji was holding him even tighter than before, and Ash was somehow in the middle of a natural disaster and the cosiest he’d ever been.

Him and Eiji; they just fit together. It was like they didn’t know how else to be.

“You really chose this place, huh?” Ash remarked after a moment, awed. “Even if one day, it’s going to get totalled by an asteroid? Even when it’s such a mess?”

“Yes. Of course,” Eiji murmured. “I mean, you’ve been on Earth for a while now. You know it’s not always like this. There are so many more good days than bad ones. And I can’t just leave my home because it’s having a bad day.”

“You’re so fucking cool, Eiji.”

Eiji waved away the compliment. Honest, honey-maple, beautiful.

“I’m really not. Home is just worth it.”

Chapter Text

Entry #6          Confetti Rainbow

The colour of endlessness.

The colour of hundreds and thousands, the colour of vibrancy born from clash.

The colour of scattering white light, birthday cake centres, soap bubbles at noon.

The color of breakthroughs, the colour of dimension.

The colour of wanting it all.

---

“How about a picnic date?”

“Too intense. Plus, I’d burn the food before I ever managed to get it in a basket.”

“A poem, then. Short and sweet.”

“Absolutely not, Bones; he’ll laugh.”

“Well, yeah; but in a good way!”

“Denied.”

“Ooh, I got it. A solder-wire heart; you can make it right now! Y’all got an iron somewhere, don’t you? Make him a cute little heart necklace.”

“I…No.”

Shorter chucked a half-eaten plum at Ash’s face from across the lunch table. Ash dodged it but hurt bloomed in his chest as he watched it splat on the asphalt.

Whose bright idea was it to take their lunch break on the runway?

Oh right, it was his.

Because he liked the wind in his hair and the respite from the smell of engine oil in the hangar and peering over the edge of the roof to watch the Vitae kids run their endurance drills on the hell-mountain.

He liked how unmissable Eiji was in his red short-shorts; one cap amid twenty sunglasses. He liked how, if the conversation relaxed, he’d hear snatches of Eiji’s laughter on the wispy breeze.

 Ash looked back at the split plum. He wished he’d caught it.

He wished he’d saved it.

“You’ve got no sense of romance, Lynx,” Shorter huffed, and Ash chuckled mirthlessly.

Only he knew how untrue that comment was, and that was how he liked it. He rested an elbow on the table, his head propped up in his palm as he turned to take in the view.

Eiji was kneeling on the summit of the hell-mountain, hands dangling over the edge to help one of the other Vitae kids up the ladder as they struggled to climb to the top. The sun played chase-my-tail on his back as his muscles strained, then shimmered like pixie dust on his face as he straightened, pulling his classmate onto the top of the mountain along with him. They sprawled on the cement, exhausted, and Eiji patted their shoulder encouragingly as they panted.

Ash drew in an indulgent breath. Any second now he was sure, the soulless solid cement under Eiji’s feet would erupt into a meadow, filled with flowers of the most ethereal variety.

A sunflower one minute, a rose the next, a bluebell right after.

Eiji smiled like he could work miracles, after all.

Like he could pull the most dormant seeds from under the earth and into the sunlight.

Case in point: just as he began to think this, Eiji looked in the direction of the Aviation building.

Then looked in Ash’s direction specifically. Then took off his cap and waved it at him, grinning as if they were alone; as if he wasn’t standing amongst three other people who could obviously see what he was doing.

Ash’s entire body crackled to life like a sparkler. The warmth swirling in his chest rushed to his face; he didn’t need a mirror to know that the blush was spreading across the bridge of his nose and claiming his cheeks.

He smiled back, chewing on his lip.

Sunflower one minute, rose the next, indeed.

He didn’t even see Shorter’s hand coming at him; forgot entirely about the others at lunch as his gaze entangled with Eiji’s. Only to be cruelly reminded of their presence when one of Shorter’s well-aimed swipes knocked his forearm out from under his head and had his face clattering down onto the table in a graceless heap.

Howls of laughter exploded around him as Ash picked himself off the surface, equal parts indignant and ungainly.

Kong and Bones he was able to shut up with a vicious glare, but Shorter continued to cackle as he waved to Eiji too, who was at least doing Ash the favour of pressing his laughter into the back of his hand.

Ash took a moment to imagine Eiji in his arms, the lilting melody of his voice pressed into his shoulder, into that oddly ticklish spot just under his ears, and then proceeded to deal Shorter a particularly nasty kick in the shin.

“Pull that shit again and I will withhold your precious spaceplane from you in the name of repairs for another week,” Ash warned.

Shorter clutched his poor leg dramatically, but the smug upturn of his lips remained. “You pull that shit again and I tell Eiji myself.”

Ash scowled, childish self-consciousness pulling his body taut. “You wouldn’t dare.”

“Wouldn’t I?” Shorter threw back. He was still as undaunted as before, but there was an undercurrent of something akin to sympathy in his voice now. “It’s not like that information is gonna come out of left field, you know. He’d probably just say ‘Yeah, no shit’. Neither of you are even trying to hide it anymore. You could probably just kiss him at the bike stands today and be done with it. So, what the hell’s stopping you, Ash?”

And oh, Ash could tell him exactly why, could spend hours sorting through all the lies and secrets, all the grievous implications and the self-eviscerations.

The story was so much bigger than him, and routinely trampled all over his selfish little wants as every single clue that Max and Jess uncovered added chapter upon chapter to it. There were days when he came so close to not mattering in the grand scheme of things; so close to just being collateral damage from the shenanigans of young bleeding hearts who’d thought themselves invincible enough to take on half the galaxy.

But in the end the bottom line was that he’d been tied inextricably to the tale before he’d been old enough to comprehend the full scope of it.

So, there Ash had remained, glass leash round his neck, tethered to the decisions of a noble ghost, watching the world pass him by from behind a gelatinous veil.

Cursed to look, but never touch, never actualize, never merge with.

And then there had been Earth.

Scorching sunlight. The rumble of engines, singing double time with the beat of his heart. All his new friends, stumbling through life on a snowball’s chance in hell and everything they had to give.

Eiji, Eiji, Eiji.

Cinnamon-sugar in his veins and wings beneath his feet, stardust and spring water spun into a dream.

Distortion. Saturation. Colour.

 Oh, Ash had never been struck with so intense a desire to splinter through his crystal cage and taste the open sky.

But for all the give his leash had, it made sure that he never strayed too far, never got too cocky, never forgot, that he was here in this little pocket of joy on borrowed time, coasting by on a falsehood.

A falsehood so flimsy that one wrong move would set it aflame, and all the newfound vivacity he’d come to love would burn away into the ether.

Leaving behind nothing but ash.

Just Ash, all alone.

And well, he was tired of being alone.

Yes, Ash could tell Shorter exactly what was stopping him, and yet…

And yet.

What was that refrain about stubborn fucking armour?

“It’s complicated, Shorter,” he said at length. “Eiji is—he—I—I don’t…I don’t deserve him, alright?”

Shorter’s brow furrowed in confusion, and Ash rubbed the spot where his temple had collided with the metal of the table, wondering belatedly if it would bruise.

It’d be fitting if it did.

Mottled and purple, a little bluebell to remind him that Eiji was made from far too much folklore and preciousness to ever kiss him there.

“Ash, come on, that’s just bullsh—”

“You guys! You guys, oh my God, shut the fuck up; I have news!”

Alex cut Shorter off as he ran up to them, red-faced and wheezing like he’d sprinted up the stairs all the way to the roof. Shorter shot Ash a quick ‘this isn’t over’ look, before turning his gaze to Alex, shifting further down the bench to make room for him as he set down his backpack and water bottle in a frenzied rattling.

“The fuck’s going on?” Bones asked, regarding Alex from over top of his sandwich.

“I’ll tell you what the fuck is going on,” Alex hissed, opening his water bottle only to empty a fourth of it over his head. “Professor Dawson is dead.”

Ash’s breath caught in his throat on its way out, and dread sunk its talons deep into his chest. Suddenly, every visceral memory of that evening at Chang Dai came flooding back into his consciousness.

The whoosh of fuel meeting fire, the crunch of glass under his feet, the heft of the hockey stick in his palms, and Dawson’s shrieks most of all.

His battered face blabbering frantically about one failed attack. His ravaged car evidence of the second.

Was…had the third time been the proverbial charm?

Ash didn’t know for sure, but across from him Shorter’s sat up in rapt attention, and from the way he scrutinized Alex, Ash knew that it wasn’t just his mind racing a hundred miles per hour.

“Damn, poor guy,” Kong murmured, looking up at the sky as if that would keep his voice from wobbling. “How’d it happen?”

“They’re saying it was the hurricane,” Alex informed, shaking the excess water out of his hair, and fanning himself in an attempt to cool off faster. “I heard Professor Meredith say he got hit in the head with flying debris.”

“Debris?” Shorter repeated, far too openly dubious. “What fucking kind of debris managed to get past his hurricane tarps?”

“He didn’t have any up.”

Ash’s eyes widened, even as he fought to school his expression into harmless curiosity. “How’s that possible? Eiji told me those were like…Storm Survival 101. How could he not have put any up?”

“I mean, maybe it got him when he was asleep, you know?” Bones offered, and Ash had to admit that was a good point. The same thing had nearly happened to Michael and him; it wasn’t totally implausible for it to happen to Dawson as well.

Maybe he was reading too much into it. God, if this was the universe’s way of doling out coincidence this was an especially uncanny rendition.

“Don’t know about that,” Alex said thoughtfully. “I guess he could’ve been asleep, but from what everyone’s whispering, it looks like they found him face down on his desk, not in bed.”

Huh. On second thought…

Kong seemed hesitant to pursue this conspiratorial thread. “People sleep at their desks, though, especially if they’re working on something.”

“Yes, they do. Makes sense,” Ash mumbled superficially, and Shorter threw him a glance, mutely asking if he was actually buying into this. Ash stared back, imploring Shorter with his whole being to keep his speculations to himself.

There really was no need to pull any more people they cared about into this whole mess.

Especially if Ash’s hunch ended up being right and involved parties were officially starting to die under mysterious circumstances.

Thankfully, Shorter seemed to swallow his qualms, instead asking, “Will Mecha have a memorial for him soon?”

Alex sighed heavily. “Yeah, eventually. Just as soon as they manage to get into his office on campus. It’s locked, obviously, and they haven’t been able to find his keys at his place yet. Hopefully they’ll get it open tomorrow.”

Okay. That was plenty suspicious.

It was all perfectly innocent at first pass, but knowing what he and Shorter knew, yeah, the whole thing just reeked of foul play.

This was not just some random accident, no, something had been set into motion here. Ash didn’t know what, but he fully intended to find out.

“All right, all right gather round, break’s over!"

Professor Meredith’s booming voice swept across the runway, and everybody reluctantly packed away their lunch boxes into their backpacks. Ash walked, stewing in what he’d heard, while the rest jogged up to where Meredith was standing, tucked into the shade of the hangar. The man looked run ragged, scratching at his beard as he cycled through the marching orders for the rest of the school day.

“Right, okay, Grizzly, Ultra, Lynx; you three are going to work on Cloudbird; it’s got a busted wing and it’s going to need recalibration.”

Ash chorused his bored ‘Roger that’ along with the other two riggers, as Meredith pointed his clipboard at each set of students as he went down the roster. Five sluggish minutes passed, and then Meredith said the words that had Ash doing a double-take yet again that day.

“And…let’s see, we’ve got…yeah okay, Contrail, Bluejay, Rain and…Shorter, dogfighting drills. You’ll be partnered according to —”

“Wait, hold up, Professor,” Shorter interjected. “I thought I was going to be scheduled for advanced ammo training today.”

Meredith glowered at him. “You were, but Arthur’s unreliable ass isn’t at school today, so you’re just going to have to take his spot. We can’t run dogfighting drills two-on-one with junior pilots.”

Oh, of course. How fucking convenient.

“Why isn’t he at school, Professor?”

“Hell if I know, Kong; all I know is that you guys were supposed to have gone back to your assignments ten minutes ago and somehow all of you are still here asking me inane questions! Now, go on, get, every minute you waste is an extra minute I’m gonna hold you back after school.”

A litany of groans rippled through the throng as the students dispersed, and Shorter fell into step with Ash as they ambled away from the gathering, careful to keep their distance from their friends.

“You thinking what I’m thinking?” Shorter whispered.

Ash faltered for a moment, weighing his options. This was really the kind of thing that he should only trust Max with and then promptly forget about, but Max…Max trusted other people too, didn’t he? He trusted Jess, and Jess trusted Nadia, and Nadia trusted Shorter.

And Shorter…

I trust you, brother.

Fuck it.

“Dawson was murdered,” Ash said matter-of-factly.

“And by our favourite neighbourhood shit-disturber no less,” Shorter added, nose wrinkling in disgust. “I don’t know what the fuck he’s after, but he’s after something. He’s gonna break into Dawson’s office today before the cops smash the lock and cart all his stuff away; you see if he doesn’t.”

“I know. It’s such a stupid idea. He openly went after Dawson in front of all of us, including fucking Charlie; does he think anyone but him is going to be on the cops’ hitlist?”

“Pfft. Exactly. Idiot.”

“So…like, are we gonna break into that office before him, or what?”

“Obviously. Meet me by the stairwell in ten.”

---

“You wanna explain this?”

Ash chuckled dryly, crouched in front of the locked door of Dawson’s office, small flathead screwdriver in one hand and a scrap piece of steel wire in the other. From the way Shorter regarded him from over his shoulder while he kept look-out, Ash could tell he was both impressed and unsettled.

“You wanna explain what you were planning to do without this?” he deflected, keeping his voice even.

Shorter scratched the nape of his neck. “I don’t know, normal stuff. Kicking the door in.”

Ash couldn’t help but smile. “You’d have made a fucking racket.”

“You didn’t answer the question.”

“It’s just something I picked up. You’d be surprised how bored you can get in an eight by ten metal box when there’s nothing to look at outside the window,” Ash said casually, as if Max had not explicitly sat him down at age ten and taught him how to pick locks: deadbolt, combo, magnetic, the whole nine yards.

At this point, a basic single-cylinder like this one was peanuts.

But it wouldn’t do to make Shorter too wary. He was already catching on a bit too fast for Ash’s liking, even if he was nodding along like he’d accepted the half-truth. So, he took a little longer than he usually would, jostled the wire and fidgeted with the screwdriver a little harder than necessary.

Carefully projecting talented amateur, instead of well-practiced whiz-kid.

All while Shorter watched the empty hallway, covering Ash with his bulk so that nobody who emerged from the stairwell too suddenly would catch sight of him before he was able to tuck the shady tools into his pockets.

When the lock finally disengaged, it startled Shorter, and he twitched like someone had slipped an ice cube into the back of his shirt.

“You’re too easy,” Ash snickered as he pushed down the handle and swung the door open.

Shorter clapped him on the back as he walked through. “Under three minutes. My compliments to the chef.”

Ash rolled his eyes and went in after, trying to ignore the fact that Shorter had been keeping count.

He was so caught up in the implications of that, that he didn’t notice that Shorter had come to an absolute standstill in front of him, and Ash bumped awkwardly into his back.

“What the—” he started to say, before his words stuffed themselves back into his throat, chasing the desiccated air in the room into his lungs. Ash stared around him, rooted to the spot much like Shorter was, fear rising to the forefront of his mind like a kraken swimming up from the depths of the ocean.

The office had been thoroughly trashed, and whoever had done so had done it with impunity.

Cabinets were upturned and emptied, their drawers hanging out like broken jaws. Books and files were strewn over every available surface, flipped through, torn in half. Hell, even the floorboards were ripped out, the wallpaper slashed open, and the cushioned chair gutted like an animal.

It presented like indiscriminate violence, but Ash saw it for what it was: a targeted ransacking, for something incredibly secret.

“We’re too late. The bastard beat us to it,” Shorter rasped, turning to Ash.

Yes, he could’ve, but…there was something else here, an uneasiness that Ash didn’t know how to shake. It was…too intelligent, the way the room had been massacred, Ash realized, as he looked closer. It had certainly been staged to mimic chaos, to mimic thoughtlessness, but there were patterns there for the eye that searched for them.

Books destroyed exactly down the middle, papers spread a little too evenly across the table, floorboards removed in orderly clumps of three, slashes clustered in groups of five, made in clean lines with a knife instead of clawed out with nails.

Too careful to be Arthur in the minutia, a discomfort in the atmosphere that didn’t infuriate but intimidated instead.

“It’s not Arthur; this is someone else,” Ash breathed. “We’re not the only ones interested in Dawson’s side hustles.”

There was a faint rustle then, like boots brushing past paper, and all of a sudden it hit Ash.

The ever so slight scratches on the keyhole that his lock-picking hadn’t made. The eerie vacancy of the hallway that nobody had disturbed. The door—

The fucking door behind them that they hadn’t closed.

The door behind them that now clicked shut emphatically.

“Gold star for the Lynx. You really live up to your reputation, don’t you, Ash?”

Shorter whipped around, and Ash’s eyes clamped shut, his breath shaking on the exhale.

Shit.

“Cain.”

He almost couldn’t bring himself to turn around, couldn’t bring himself to confront what this could possibly mean going forward. He didn’t have any weapons, any innocent justifications and worst of all, his friend was right there, pulled into the thick of it.

Altogether too disadvantaged for his tastes, but if there was once thing Ash would not do, it was back down from a fight.

He turned slowly, considering his choices. Cain was blocking off the door; Ash figured he’d been hiding behind it when they’d walked in. He was much bigger than both him and Shorter, but there were two of them. He’d have to be quick with it, but if Shorter held Cain down, one well-aimed stab with the screwdriver in his pocket—

Oh, shit. There was a gun in Cain’s hand.

Ash cursed himself. What else was he expecting from the darling of the Combat department?

“Come on, you two. You know what to do,” Cain said, pointing the gun at them. He was guarded, firm, but he sounded like someone had taken a sandpaper to his vocal chords. “Don’t make me say it.”

Ash obliged, raising his hands to where Cain could see them, but it took some frantic hissing on his part for Shorter to do the same. A trembling sort of rage seemed to be coming over his friend, his body rigid and tone clipped as he fought to speak past gritted teeth.

“What’s your game here, Cain? Are you working with Arthur?”

Cain’s expression scrunched up, somewhere between puzzled and insulted. “Do you think I’d stoop that low?”

“No, but I also didn’t think you’d ever point a gun at me, so I must just be a terrible judge of character,” Shorter snapped.

Ooh, ouch. That one looked like it genuinely hurt Cain.

“You don’t understand. It wasn’t supposed to happen this way,” Cain said, shaking his head, his words oscillating between helpless and barbed. “No one was supposed to be down here; no one had any reason to be. So why, why are you?”

“Why should we tell you?”

“Because I’m the one with the gun.”

That was truly when the room went deadly silent. Shorter’s face paled, and Ash didn’t have to look his way to know that all he could think about were Sing and Nadia.

“You’re not going to kill us.” It sounded more like a demand than anything else, despite how hoarse Shorter’s voice was. “You—you wouldn’t.”

Cain was quiet in the wake of that, and perhaps that should have been answer enough for Shorter. But then he spoke, and Ash saw his severe gaze grow beseeching for the first time.

“Not for myself I wouldn’t. But it’s bigger than me, Shorter.”

“What is?”

“I can’t tell you,” Cain’s voice cracked, and he gripped the gun tighter, as if it was a lifeline.

“Why the fuck not?”

“It’s too important; it means more than individual lives. No matter what happens here, we’d all be nothing more than a footnote of a footnote of history.”

Huh. Was that how it was?

“Funny,” Shorter scoffed. “You know who else said something like that to me, recently? Arthur.”

Cain’s shoulders drooped, like he was tired of belabouring this point. “I told you I’ve got nothing to do with him.”

“You’ve got a gun in our face, Cain; why should we believe you?”

“You’ve known me half your life, Wong.”

“And yet you’d kill me and my friend!”

“That will depend on your answers to my questions. Why are you here? Why are you interested in Dawson?”

Ah. Ash had it now.

The leverage. The strategy. The way out.

He took a deep breath, forced his muscles to relax, then opened his mouth.

“You show us yours; we’ll show you ours.”

Cain looked at him for the first time since the conversation started, a bemused smile playing on his lips. “I always knew there was something reckless about you. Do you really think you’re in any position to negotiate?”

“I do actually.” Ash plastered on a confident smirk, then bit the inside of his cheek.

Here went nothing.

He sauntered forward, hands still in the air, but acting like the gun wasn’t there. Even though he was acutely aware of how it shifted to aim at his chest instead of Shorter’s. But Ash took heart from that and prayed that his silver tongue wouldn’t fail him now.

“See the thing is, I texted Max and Charlie before we came down here. They know what we’re doing here, and they’re expecting to hear back from me in the next…hmm...five-ten minutes or so. And if they don’t, they know to come here and…well—deal with whatever happens to us. Now, we’re not going to talk first, so sure, you could kill us, but I can promise you, you wouldn’t get away with it whatsoever.”

“Ash! Get back here!” Shorter shouted after him, but Ash ignored him, approaching Cain with every word, subtly forcing him back against the door.

Every step he took gave him more confidence. Because his impression of Cain was correct, and Shorter was in fact an excellent judge of character.

Cain would never actually kill them. He was new at this, the whole extortion gambit, and was displeased with himself for having to resort to it.

And a person like that, a person with principles, could always be extorted right back.

Ash knew all too well.

“I could just pin it on Arthur, couldn’t I?” Cain pointed out.

He cocked the gun, and Shorter called after Ash again, “Ash, stop it; he’s serious!”

No, he wasn’t. Ash could hear the quiver in Cain’s voice loud and clear as he said, “I made the office look like it was him; I could just as easily make your deaths look like his fault too.”

Ash laughed, hollow. Cain wouldn’t even say the word.

“First of all, they wouldn’t be deaths, Cain. They’d be murders,” he said, and Cain winced. “And second of all, no, you couldn’t. Arthur’s police record shows him to be exclusively working with knives and pipes and lists no gun-slinging associates. Besides, no one outside the Combat upperclassmen could even get their hands on a .38 like yours; the cops here all pack .45s. You’re the first person Charlie will come see.”

Cain balked, and the barrel of the gun bumped against Ash’s chest. The metal felt like frostbite through his t-shirt, and Ash could feel his lunch threatening to come up his throat, but he kept it together.

He could do this. One last push.

“Is that what you want, Cain?” Ash asked, politeness tempered with venom. “The reputation of the ‘upstanding’, ‘responsible’ Combat department tarnished by a murder investigation that could bring into question its existence at the Academy? Not to mention the budget and space immigration fast-track benefits it gets from the colony scholarship programs. Do you want to be dropped from those programs in your final year? Do you want your name attached to Arthur’s of all people? Do you want a cop to have it out for you? Do you want every force on this planet to bind you to it, so that you could never escape like you so desperately want to? Because that is exactly what will happen if you shoot us. Wouldn’t you rather risk it and talk? You’ve known Shorter half your life, haven’t you?”

Cain stared at him, sizing him up. His hands seemed to forget the gun for a moment; Ash felt him lower it slightly as the gears turned in his head. A tendril of hope unfurled within Ash, but suddenly the barrel was pressed harder against his sternum, and Ash had to lock every joint in his body in place to keep from jolting.

“Shorter, I know well,” Cain conceded. “But you, Ash, I think I know even less than I did before. What’s the guarantee that you’ll talk after I do?”

Ash allowed himself a real smile this time. Even under duress, Cain was still sharp as a tack.

Good thing he’d anticipated it.

“I’m the guarantee,” Ash said easily enough, gesturing to the gun between them. “You’re welcome to shoot me if either of us refuses. But just me. I’d like your word that Shorter leaves this room alive no matter what.”

“Fuck you, Ash!” Shorter yelped. “You don’t get to do that!”

“Too late. It’s already done,” Ash dismissed, before fixing Cain with a challenging look. “So? Do we have a deal?”

Snakes slithered under Ash’s skin and the very air in the room seemed to hold its breath as Cain contemplated the proposal.

Then at long last, he said, “Fine. Deal.”

Ash bit back a smile. He finally understood what Max meant, when he talked about all his rash schemes.

High risk; high reward.

“The people of the space colonies have long been dissatisfied by the central alliance leadership,” Cain explained, jittery and watchful as if he was expecting an eavesdropper to crawl out of the woodwork any second. “Twenty years ago, a coalition of ex-coms and political criminals started to build a resistance. They tried to make changes from the inside, but now that too many of the major players are oligarchies or authoritarian, they’ve decided to risk open war.”

Shorter’s jaw dropped. “Are they crazy?! No one in this corner of the universe has the fucking resources to survive another conflict. As if the last two energy wars didn’t do enough damage—”

“They know that, Shorter,” Cain cut in, exasperated. “And they’re going to do it anyway. Because it’s gotten that bad. We’ve—the colony leadership has been lying to us our entire lives, Shorter; it’s not some paradise up there; they—the higher ups hoard food and tech; they control the press and the schools; Elysium’s got tracking devices on all citizens for God’s sake.”

Shorter flinched, disbelief plain as day on his face, before looking to Ash.

“It’s true,” Ash confirmed with a grimace. “And he’s leaving out the worst of it.”

Shorter’s expression crumbled, sandcastle in the rain, grief dissolved in anger. “I don’t know about all that. All I know is that ‘up there’ steals from us whenever they’re in a pinch. What do you think would happen to the Earth settlements if fucking cosmic war broke out? They’d bleed us dry the first chance they got!”

“They would,” Cain concurred. “If we weren’t also in on it.”

What a day for Shorter Wong of all people to be stunned silent.

Ash would’ve laughed if his stomach wasn’t lurching, his heart beating painfully against the barrel of a gun.

“About five years ago, the Earth settlements decided to join the fight, with the promise of fairer trade dealings and resource distribution with the colonies. Wolfsbane was the first to throw its hat into the ring. That is where I come in. I smuggle weapons to the movement. A fourth of the Combat department does.”

It took both Ash and Shorter a good minute to process that revelation. Admittedly, Shorter was having a harder time of it than Ash; Cain had effectively turned his entire understanding of the world on its head. Ash could tell that the emotions there were far too jumbled for vocalizing: betrayal, apprehension, denial, and admiration all knitted into an overwhelming mass. He’d been like that once, watching powerlessly while Max and Jess consistently picked fights with the powers that be.

Sickened by the truth because it was always disorienting and frigid; it offered no warmth, no comfort, no closure. For all its righteousness, it never quite felt right.

It was a feeling Ash was accustomed to, so it was him who had the wherewithal to remind Cain of the original question.

“What’s any of that got to do with Dawson? Why’d you toss his office?”

“His brother designed this nanotech thing back in the day, codenamed FISH,” Cain outlined, jaw tense. “The resistance didn’t know exactly what it was; their guess was that it was some sort of new and improved bullet, or covert surveillance system. What they did know for sure though, was that the central alliance was paying a fuckton of money for it, in partnership with this shady-ass conglomerate led by an oligarch, Golzine, so of course, this thing was bad news. But before anyone could do anything about it, all the research was stolen by this young journalist fourteen years ago. Some guy called—”

Something slimy and stifling wound its tentacles around Ash’s heart.

No, no, no, this couldn’t be happening, Cain couldn’t still be talking, there was no way in hell he would actually say—

“—Griffin Callenreese.”

Ash’s ears began to ring, almost as if they were rejecting the sound itself, unfamiliar now that it wasn’t Max’s or Jess’ voice speaking the name.

“Supposedly, he was going to go public with the information, but he was killed before he could, and the research was lost to the killer.”

The very ground below Ash’s feet was starting to turn into a whirlpool; God, how could Cain still be talking? How could he still be reaching into the recesses of Ash’s mind and dragging out all of this…this horror and gore in front of Shorter to see—

“The trail went cold for more than a decade after that, and Dawson’s brother was presumed dead. But a few days before the hurricane, the resistance got a tip that Professor Dawson had worked on the research too; that he knew things about how to weaponize FISH that even his brother didn’t know, which is why the thing had not been used in all this time. They wanted me to find the complete information on FISH and pass it along to them. Along with Dawson. They wanted him alive.”

“But Arthur got to him first,” Shorter finished, aghast.

“My guess is that he works for Golzine,” Cain said grimly. “It’d certainly explain why he’s been stunting so much these days.”

Oh, stop. No more. Ash had heard enough.

“Put the damn gun down, Cain,” he sighed, the adrenaline draining from his limbs, leaving behind nothing but thorns and searing air. “We’re on the same side.”

“We are?” Cain and Shorter chorused, equally baffled by that response.

Ash nodded resolutely and met Cain’s eyes. “You ever see a picture of Griffin Callenreese?”

Cain blinked at him, non-plussed. “Y-yeah, I have one on my phone, why—”

Ash pointed to his own face. “Look familiar?”

It took a whole minute for Cain to see the light. But when he finally did, it was as if he was staring into the blinding depth of a solar eclipse.

“No way,” he gasped. “You’re his—”

“Half-brother, yeah. And Max is his best friend. Him and Jess are here to finish what he started.”

Funnily enough, it was this that got Shorter to finally move. He came to stand by Ash’s side then, and Cain made no move to stop him as he put a hand on Ash’s shoulder. “So…so you’re not—”  

“No,” Ash said, his voice half-strangled. “My family aren’t textbook researchers, they’re journalists. They’ve been chasing Griff’s killer, that research and Golzine for as long as I can remember. Charlie’s the newest member of the… ‘team’, or whatever, but—”

His words lodged in his chest, but Ash made himself push them out anyway, casting Shorter an apologetic look.

“—Shunichi and Nadia have been helping them for years.”

Shorter blanched, and Ash hung his head, ashamed to have to be the one to do this to his friend. “You can ask her about it,” he said, each word a chore. “She—she didn’t want you to get involved, but she won’t lie if you ask.”

Not the way Ash had.

“That’s why we came down here,” he went on. “Max is sure that the power plant is secretly financed by Golzine, and Dawson’s brother fucking works there. I saw him do some sort of hand-off with Arthur a while ago. Then Arthur went and blew up Professor Dawson’s car in front of Chang Dai. So, when we heard that Dawson had died and that Arthur was AWOL, we figured we’d try to get to the office before Arthur did. See if we could find whatever he was looking for.”

“I…I see,” Cain stammered, and full-bodied relief rippled through Ash as the gun was withdrawn, and tucked out of sight.

He slumped, too dazed to even perceive the hand Cain held out to him until Shorter shook it on both their behalfs.

“Forgive me,” Cain said sheepishly. “I was out of line.”

Shorter muttered a ‘Damn right’ with no bite, and Ash snorted. “No, you weren’t. But I appreciate the apology.”

Cain smiled then, and the tension between them all dissipated like smoke from a fire long dead, all of them glad to be on the same page.

“So, did you find it? The research?” Shorter asked.

Cain shook his head, dejected. “I checked everywhere. Twice. It’s not here.”

“Then we can assume Dawson had it on him when he died,” Shorter reasoned, smacking a palm on his forehead. “Which means Arthur probably has it already, and today has been a waste of time.”

“Not entirely,” Ash mused. “If he has it already, then why isn’t he at school today? What’s he doing?”

“Who knows. But I’m gonna keep an eye on him from now,” Cain said, gaze flinty with determination.

“So will we,” Shorter decided. “Keep us in the loop, yeah? Let us know if you hear something.”

Cain nodded his affirmation, and with that, they all made their departures from the office, sprinting up the stairs as fast as they could.

“Make sure you text Max and Charlie back,” Shorter managed between breaths, pulling Ash along as they took the steps three at a time. “With any luck, they’re not already on their way down here.”

A wry laugh punched itself out of Ash’s lungs. “Oh, don’t worry about that. I never actually texted them.”

Shorter smacked him upside the head for that, which was…fair enough, in Ash’s opinion.

Didn’t stop him from squawking irately in protest, though.

“You bluffed?! You fucking bluffed while Bloody Cain had a killing machine in your face?!”

“Lay off, it worked, didn’t it?”

“What if it hadn’t, dumbass? What if he’d asked to see the text?”

“But he didn’t ask. I figured he wouldn’t; his head was too clouded. You saw him back there; he hated doing that to us, to you especially.”

Shorter side-eyed him, his grin effervescent. “Cain was right. You are one reckless son of a bitch.”

“High risk, high reward, right?” Ash said with a wink.

Shorter laughed, and they used the rest of their energy to bring themselves back up to the runway of the Aviation building. It wasn’t until they had to part ways for their respective assignments, that Shorter spoke again.

“I get it now, by the way.”

“Get what?” Ash inquired, legitimately clueless thanks to the oxygen deprivation from running up the stairs.

Shorter waved vaguely with one hand. “Why you won’t tell Eiji.”

Cold fire licked at Ash’s bones, and he stared Shorter down, stone-faced. “Glad we got that straightened out. Does this mean you’ll stop badgering me?”

“I will,” Shorter swore, before cracking a sly smile. “Though, I will say, for the official record, that I still think you should tell him.”

Ash’s eyes bugged out, and he swatted at Shorter with the back of his hand. “Wha—you said you understood!”

“Yeah, I said I understood; not that I agreed,” Shorter retorted primly, much to Ash’s chagrin.

“Ugh, miss me with your semantic technicalities.”

Shorter remained unfazed, proclaiming haughtily, “If there’s one thing Earth teaches you, Starboy, it’s that the world is terrible, and death is a bitch that ruins everything. So, live well, without regrets, while you still can. You feel me?”

“Yes, I feel that you’d make a very good low-budget motivational speaker,” Ash deadpanned, his arms crossed.

“This is the problem with today’s youth,” Shorter said, feigning affront as he clutched his imaginary pearls. “No respect for the hard-won wisdom of their elders!”

“Yeah, ‘cause that’s what you’ve got knocking around inside your head. Wisdom.”

“Okay but like jokes aside, there was not one thing I heard today that would change Eiji Okumura’s mind about you.”

Ash hesitated; his voice small in the face of that impossibility. “…You—You can’t know that. Not for sure.”

“No…but, hey. High risk, high reward. Right, Ash?” Shorter winked.

He got smacked upside the head for that, which was…fair enough, in Ash’s opinion.

---

“—and that’s not even the half of it. They gave me fucking detention too, like the damn lecture wasn’t enough; made me sit there in the basement and stare at the fucking wall when I didn’t even take new parts! The ones I took were this close to being scrap metal; they were just sitting in storage, being ignored for months, but oh, suddenly, it’s a fucking travesty when I take some just so Mikey can have some cool robots for his birthday—”

“Aslan?”

“—and he deserves cool robots; he’s been so good these past few weeks, while Max and Jess have been so busy with—well, with their…research stuff. And I like, know for a fact that him and his friend Skip would appreciate having robots to play with; they said so, and now I can’t make them because Mecha admin are filthy hoarders—”

“Aslan—”

“—and then Shorter called and said that a pipe burst in Chang Dai so we can’t have the party there, which means that we’ll have to do it at our place, which fucking sucks, because he’s always at our place, and I wanted him to be able to get out of the house a little, and then I swung by the grocery store, and they’ve chosen this week to be out of strawberries and vanilla beans, so there goes the entire cake, and don’t even get me started on décor; it’s all just—I’m just—like I don’t understand—”

“Aslan.”

Ash finally stopped, looking back over his shoulder, and expecting to see a floor scuffed raw thanks to his incessant pacing, charred from the friction of his feet against the wood. He expected to itch uncontrollably now that he was standing still for the first time since he’d begun planning Michael’s birthday party; he expected to implode, because there was still more rant left in his system.

But nothing of the sort happened.

Because he was standing in the middle of Eiji’s kitchen, and bad things didn’t happen in Eiji’s kitchen.

Because Eiji was there, unreasonable in matching pyjamas and idyllic in mismatched oven mitts. The dye-ruined apron tied around his waist rendering him improper, the sunset-glazed gleam in his eyes rendering him incandescent.

Soft, patient, persevering.

Welcome improbability; candle-flame bright against all rationale in the yawning chasm of space.

The bubble of frustration within Ash that had steadily swollen throughout his tirade popped the moment their eyes met.

“What?” The word didn’t come out half as loud as he’d been talking before.

Eiji smiled, all candied ginger and cheek. “Would you like a cookie?”

He held out a tray, fresh from the oven and full of sugar cookies.

Ash pouted, and went over to the kitchen counter, at the end of which a small space had been cleared for him none too discretely. He hopped up onto it and pulled Eiji towards him by the corner of his pyjama sleeve.

“Yeah, I want a cookie,” he said begrudgingly.

He plucked one from the tray, snapping it in half and blowing on it tentatively before taking a bite.

Oh, yes. Tender, just chewy enough, and holding its star shape perfectly.

A+ cookie, and why wouldn’t it be?

Only magic things happened in Eiji’s kitchen.

Brilliant dyes every shade of the universe were made there; roses were tucked into hair and Starboys with smart mouths were bewitched there.

Cookies were shared and troubles were banished there.

“Amazing. I could eat the whole tray,” Ash praised, and Eiji beamed, pinching Ash’s cheeks where they rounded thanks to his full mouth. “Mikey will love them.”

“Not as much as he will love the surprise party that you’re working so hard to throw for him,” Eiji countered.

“Some party,” Ash said sourly, picking at the peeling skin by his right thumb nail. “It’s practically ruined.”

Eiji pulled Ash’s fingers away from the area, stopping him before he could draw any blood. “Nothing’s ruined. If we can’t do the strawberry cake, then we’ll make a giant cookie cake.”

His fingers traced over Ash’s, sea-silk and cloud-kiss and intention, and Ash shivered pleasantly. “What’s a cookie cake?”

“It’s a giant cookie the size of a cake!” Eiji said earnestly. “We can even make it layered.”

“Can we make it star-shaped?” Ash ventured, mulling the idea over, “And do different-coloured layers?”

Eiji gave his hand a squeeze. “Of course, we can. I have a lot of edible things to dye with. Raspberries, cocoa powder, butterfly pea flowers…which, now that I’m thinking about it, would be beautiful for décor. Matter of fact, any flowers you can find in my garden, you can use, okay?”

“But Chang Dai is not—”

“We can deck up the roof of our building then,” Eiji suggested.

“Is that even safe?” Ash asked, unsure.

Eiji waved away the concern. “It is safe enough. I have been up there many times, and me and Shorter can go make it kid-friendly tomorrow, if you like.”

“But—” Ash found himself unable to think of any more reasons to sulk. “But your flowers, those are for your dyes—”

“They are my flowers to give away,” Eiji interrupted, adamant. “Consider it a gift.”

God, his eyes. How they shone, luminous with something that seemed intrinsic to Eiji. How they actively sought out Ash’s gaze, dared him to doubt their owner’s sincerity.

“You shouldn’t be this nice to me,” Ash complained, his voice barely more than a puff of breath between them.

He already craved it, being Eiji’s exception, his override. What would happen if he basked in it? What would happen if he got used to it?

What would happen if he had to live without it someday?

So many what-ifs, and yet they were only in Ash’s head.

Because Eiji, no all he had to say about that was, “Fuck off, Aslan. I care about you, and I will do anything I can to make you happy. End of story.”

Ash laughed properly then, cherry fizz coursing through him and incredulity bittersweet on the back of his tongue.

Only Eiji could make ‘Fuck off’ sound like a sweet nothing. Only Eiji could make ‘Aslan’ sound like an endearment.

Defiance inextricable from conviction, Eiji.

Undeniable, Eiji.

So goddamn irresistible, Eiji.

They were still holding hands, Eiji’s right on Ash’s left; glowing embers embracing chipped steel. Ash needed only to feel that warmth seeping through his skin, and he was reaching to clasp Eiji’s hand in both of his own before he could stop himself.

His thumbs tentatively drawing circles; his fingers mapping out the ridges of Eiji’s knuckles.

There was a voice in his head that disapproved, that replayed the agonizing weight of Cain’s gun against his heartbeat, the unsavoury potential repercussions of all that he’d discovered and confessed in Dawson’s office, the gravity of who he was.

Little more than a sentient lynchpin, really.

And yet Ash had the gall to succumb, to turn resentfully on that voice when a tray was set down and an oven mitt was shaken off in his periphery, to smother all thoughts into pin-drop silence when both of Eiji’s hands tangled with his own, exploring just as he had been.

Shy and captivated and yearning, yearning, yearning.

“Why…um…your skin, here,” Ash said as he turned Eiji’s hand over and ran his fingers over the top of his palm, cranberry edge to his words. “It’s peeling here. It’s calloused.”

“Perks of scaling the hell-mountain. Rope, steel bars, burning cement; you know how it is.”

The dying light spilled into the room from the window behind him, the last of the sun’s rays waltzing between his eyelashes and the strands of his hair. Ash ducked into the shadows his body cast on his face, pulling Eiji an inch closer just so they enveloped him more completely.

‘Hide me,’ he ached to say. ‘Hide me so no one can see me but you. It doesn’t have to be forever. But just for now, let me lose myself in you. I want to.’

“What about you, hm?” Eiji’s voice fell upon his ears like sugar-pear sweetness cutting through dark chocolate and chased away the unspoken words. Ash looked down at his lap as Eiji turned his hands over and trailed one finger over each of his fingertips in turn, occasionally ghosting over his cuticles. “Your skin is peeling here. There are cuts here too.”

“Those are from…from electrical wires,” Ash told him, numb to the stings that the feather-light contact caused, yet entirely alive to the feeling of Eiji’s skin on his own. “They…can be really sharp once you’ve um, you know…stripped the insulation.”

“Mm? I thought that…that you guys wore gloves?”

God, when had Eiji’s face gotten so close? When had the air between them whittled down to only what their lungs could exhale? When had Ash begun to lean in?

“Don’t like gloves,” he murmured, gaze playing touch-and-go with Eiji’s own. “They make me clumsy.”

“Really? And here I thought only potato peelers could make you clumsy.”

Ash pinched the fullness at the edge of Eiji’s palm. “You’re the worst.”

He said that, and yet he was the one shaking his bangs out of his eyes, just so he could truly appreciate the decadence clinging to Eiji’s lips like toffee, just so that there’d be a place for Eiji to rest his forehead, if he wanted. Because if Eiji nullified that token distance now, if he came close enough to be all that Ash could see, then Ash knew the rest of the world and all the overthinking that came with it would promptly fall away.

Out of sight; out of mind.

If only Eiji would take that step.

And sure enough, he did. All it took was a smile from Ash, one that had sneaked past his defences despite his efforts, and suddenly there Eiji was, his forehead against Ash’s, breathing in his involuntary giggles, a world unto himself.

“Oh, I’m the worst, am I?”

“You are.”

“Liar.”

Yes, Ash supposed he was. In all the ways Eiji meant, and in all the ways Eiji didn’t know about.

But it didn’t matter here in Eiji’s kitchen, because Ash was hidden away, and Eiji was night skies and elusive fireflies, seashores and rose gardens, an ever-burning hearth, and an ever-bright morning without the threat of rain, and Ash was lost, lost, lost.

Nothing else existed. There was not Ash’s past, nor his future, just this moment, just Eiji, just a world for the two of them together.

“Liar,” he agreed.

Ash’s voice was a waver as their noses brushed, as their grasps on each other tightened, as Eiji tipped his face up just a tiny bit and somehow pressed even closer—

—only for Ash to squeak and jerk away at the loud insistent banging of a drum somewhere outside their building.

Eiji’s eyes fluttered open, blinking slowly despite the jarring drumming, like he needed a second to come back to himself.

Then he smiled, sweet and rueful, and Ash wanted to cry.

It was gone. Their moment. Their little world.

They were back here again, in this reality in which he really had to put his head on straight and not drag Eiji into any of the dangerous messes that his other friends had already gotten embedded into, like his very smart, very rational brain was telling him to do.

Ash was trapped here again, in this reality in which he couldn’t have Eiji.

And it was all that stupid drumming’s fault.

“What. The. Fucking fuck is that?” he growled.

“The F4A is here,” Eiji said, using their joined hands to pull him off the counter and to his feet now.

“F4A?” Ash asked, disgruntled. He’d heard that phrase thrown around a bunch, but he’d never found out the meaning.

“Free 4 All,” Eiji expanded as he turned off the oven and undid his apron.

“What exactly does that mean?”

“It means, Aslan, that we’re about to solve your robot problem.”

---

Ash both hated and was indebted to the F4A.

He hated them for dunking his senses into a bucket of cold water when he was so close to tasting sunshine, so close to holding a moonbeam in his arms, so close to bursting into starlight and shedding his prickly armour.

He was, however, indebted to them for the veritable treasure trove of electronic parts they were carrying.

“The reason admin got angry with you was because they save those parts to give to the F4A,” Eiji explained to him as they ran out to the slow-moving truck as it crawled passed their building, towing a seemingly endless line of carts behind it. Eight giant drums were situated in the back of the truck, each with its own beater, and Eiji had to shout to make himself heard above their drumming.

“We never know when they are coming because they go all over Earth, so we must always be ready for them, whether we have things we can spare, or things we want. They don’t always have everything, they don’t always have enough, and they don’t always have the best, but it is free. And first come first serve, so find your parts quickly and hold on to them. Come, I brought a bag for us to fill.”

Ash followed Eiji down the street as he skipped past cart after cart. As they went the sound of the drums receded to a bearable volume, and Ash noticed that each cart was labelled to indicate what it had inside it. Some carts had people walking unhurriedly alongside them and picking out what they needed, and others had people seated inside them, sifting through the available items. One such cart had jackets, and who was wading amongst them but Shorter and Sing themselves, waving to them the moment they saw them.

“Perfect timing, you two!” Shorter said, beckoning them closer. “We need opinions!”

Sing stood next to him, one arm inside the sleeve of a mustard-yellow leather jacket and the other inside the sleeve of a deep purple bomber jacket.

“Which do you think looks better?” Sing asked, pulling the lapels of both over his chest.

“What does it matter if they’re free; take both,” Ash said, bewildered more than anything.

Sing turned towards Shorter puppy-dog eyes and all, but the latter vehemently shook his head. “He doesn’t need both,” Shorter said, stern. “He’ll grow out of them the moment he hits his growth spurt.”

“I like the purple, Sing,” Eiji put in helpfully. “It brings out your eyes.”

Sing turned the colour of pomegranate seeds and flung the yellow jacket away as if the garment had personally offended him.

Huh. Imagine that.

Shorter fell back on the pile of jackets, cackling at the sight, and Ash wondered briefly if this was new, or if he was so blinded by the way he looked at Eiji that he couldn’t see how other people were looking at him too.

Not that that was particularly important, not when Eiji was already turning away from them, his eyes lighting up as they caught sight of something and his body twisting around to reach for Ash’s hand. “Ah, here’s the cart we want!”

He led Ash down a few carts, to one labelled ‘Spare Parts-Electronic’ and held the bag for him while he sorted through all the odds and ends, searching for the ones he needed to make two humanoid robots. Some parts were loose, and the others were integrated into a half-made device, which meant that Ash had to carefully consider which ones he picked up. Not wanting Eiji to get bored, Ash encouraged him to go look in any of the other carts if he wanted.

Eiji seemed loath to leave him by himself, and butterflies danced inside the confines of Ash’s ribcage at the suggestion that Eiji felt what he felt too.

That pull; that harkening to the other. Magnetic.

That mutual gravity. Inescapable.

Eiji went eventually, only a few carts down from Ash, opting to look in a cart of full of tiles of all things. He went back and forth between that cart and Ash, coming back every so often to place pristine white tiles into their bag. Something about wanting to have them on hand to cover holes in the walls in case there was ever any water damage.

Ash carried on in relative silence for a while, listening to nothing but the faraway drumming and the sporadic plink-plink-plink of Eiji depositing more tiles into their bag, which now swung from his shoulder. That was, until Sing called his name, from about five carts ahead.

“Hey, Ash; guess what!”

“What?” Ash yelled back, not looking up from the hoard of electronic parts.

“They have a bike your size! Solid condition; great model too!”

Then Shorter’s voice, “Want me to grab it for you?”

Ash’s heart leapt up into his throat, if only to keep him from talking, to keep from replying one way or the other.

His initial instinct was ‘absolutely the fuck not’.

But God, Eiji wasn’t his chauffer, neither was it fair to make him bike over long distances hauling his weight just because Ash wanted any excuse to be against him.

But did he even need that excuse to be near Eiji anymore? Was it even a good thing to be that close to him?

Perhaps…perhaps it would be better to put some sort of distance between them. Maybe then it would…it would become easier for Ash to accept that he would never—

There was a stuttered plink behind him, and he swore internally. Eiji had heard. He slid into the empty space beside Ash, and Ash looked to him, as if he’d find the answer to Shorter’s question on his face. And Eiji—oh, he looked like he’d been left out in the rain for a week, but he smiled at Ash anyway, shattered porcelain and congealed wax. 

“I can teach you to ride the bike, if you like,” he offered, soft and genuine. “I know you’ll learn in no time.”

Turned out that that was all the convincing Ash needed.

To shout back, “No thanks Shorter, I’m good!”

Eiji’s eyes grew wide, and his lips parted in sweet surprise. “Are you sure?”

“Positive. I…I like how it is now,” Ash reiterated, bumping their shoulders together as they walked, their seeking fingers skimming over each other with every little collision. “I mean, unless you’re planning on leaving me anytime soon—”

And fucking hell, that was meant to be a throwaway comment, an idle what-if, a meaningless scenario, but Eiji, no he wouldn’t stand for it even in a hypothetical sense.

“Never, Aslan.” He looked almost affronted at the insinuation. “Do you understand? Never.”

And if Ash’s soul cried out for mercy inside his body, if it kicked and screamed within him and railed against the cosmos and whatever cruel puppeteer pulled the strings of fate, then his smile didn’t show it.

---

Today was a good day. No matter how Ash looked at it, it was a good day.

There was the roof of their building, concrete interspersed with blue and purple bedsheets laid down like carpets. Vines of butterfly pea flowers twisting around the party tables. Fat vanilla-scented candles mounted on every flat surface; the golden flames bold against the deepening blue of the sky.

There was Shunichi and Jess and Nadia, making everyone a plate, complete with cookie cake, chicken fries and an assortment of dim sum from Chang Dai. Chatting amongst themselves, and scolding Max and Charlie every time they turned their heads in their direction.

There was Bones and Kong, fretting over the consequences of having ‘borrowed’ one of Telecom’s most prized modified radios. There was Alex, barking at them to shut the fuck up and help him figure out how to jump onto one of Elysium’s music-playing frequencies.

There was Sing and Shorter too, who, having consumed quite a bit of Nadia’s homemade soda had surrendered entirely to the sugar rush, and shook and swayed most unflatteringly to Shorter’s out-of-tune singing in the biggest empty space they could find. There was Cain as well, sardonically throwing out song requests to them from a quiet corner.

There was Michael most of all, perched on Max’s shoulders, a bundle of flushed cheeks and sparkling eyes and so much delighted laughter, engaged in a chicken fight with his friend Skipper, who was similarly balanced upon Charlie’s shoulders. He had on his head the Birthday Boy crown that Ash had made for him that morning, and a blanket knotted around his neck like a cape.

It was covered with little stars and all the different paper plane designs Michael liked best.

A handmade birthday gift from Eiji.

Oh, Eiji.

He was there too, adorably on theme in his star-spangled button-up, though why he’d bothered Ash couldn’t understand. The reflection of the night sky in his eyes brought the stars down to their little party just fine, his voice leaving comet tails in its wake as he weaved amongst everybody. And when the Alex finally got the radio going, a funky guitar tune bled into the air and Eiji drew Ash into the vicinity of the dance floor with the otherworldly swing of his hips alone.

Yes, it was a wonderful day, full of wonderful things, no matter how Ash looked at it. And he was starting to think that these things might be enough too.

That his heart would accept them as consolation.

But then Eiji sashayed up to him, the song playful and hypnotic on his lips, holding out an open palm to him. And no sooner had Ash taken it that he was spun into Eiji’s arms. He let out a cheerful scream as Eiji dipped him theatrically, then led him in a goofy tango-foxtrot amalgamation all around the roof.

It was dizzying, the way Eiji twirled him, and it was dizzying the way his hands felt on Ash’s skin, wildfire caressing kindling. It was electrifying, the way Eiji sang to him as they danced, and it was electrifying the way his eyes knew nothing but Ash’s own, moonrise cherishing a meadow. It was…it was death-defying, the way Ash threw his arms around Eiji’s neck, and it was death-defying the way Eiji looked up at him like he brought the dawn with him wherever he went.

And yet Ash mourned, his heart staked through and bleeding with every step, because he knew then that it would never be enough.

Not when it came to Eiji.

But he could not ask for more, not when all it would do was put Eiji in danger. The days since the hurricane had shown him as much.

So, if he had to spend every waking moment plagued with this breathless longing, then so be it.

Anything for Eiji.

Chapter Text

Entry #7          Blush Scarlet

The colour of intoxication.

The colour of caution in the wind, the colour of adrenaline-exhilaration sangria.

The colour of neon comets, boombox hearts, touch-starved skin.

The color of urgency, the colour of overflowing.

The colour of doing what feels right.

---

Something was off.

Ash had been feeling it since he set foot in this room. By all appearances, nothing had seemed to be amiss: modest portrait of Professor Dawson, rows of chairs set up before it, minimalistic flower arrangements in chemical engineering’s characteristic shade of magenta and sunny yellow string lights adorning every wall to assuage the sombre atmosphere.

A simple yet elegant set-up for a memorial service, a genuine effort on Mecha admin’s part to honour one of their veteran professors.

By all appearances, at least.

But Ash had learnt a long time ago that appearances guaranteed fuck all.

Max had always encouraged him to trust his instincts, to trust the slowly forming knot of dread in his stomach over appearances, to trust the prickly feeling on the back of his neck even if it didn’t totally make sense in the moment. And sure enough, two minutes of standing in this room and Ash’s instincts were already squirming in disapproval.

The air was coarse, the chatter of students and faculty grated on his nerves, and there was something about how suffocatingly silent the rest of the Academy campus was that itched his brain.

And Ash had been content to keep these thoughts to himself while people were still shuffling in to pay their respects but looking around the nearly full room now and seeing what he saw, he couldn’t keep quiet anymore.

“I don’t like this, Shorter.”

Shorter turned around at the sound of his voice, already halfway down the buffet table while Ash still lingered near the corn chips. “That’s okay,” he said, his mouth full of bruschetta. “They have ceviche too, if you—”

“Not the dip, Shorter!” Ash hissed as he tracked Shorter’s gaze to the food nearest him. “This. The event.” They retreated to their corner, where Cain stood with a plate of hors d'oeuvres his hand. “We’re starting in less than five minutes, and he still isn’t here.”

Shorter scanned the throng before them, baffled. “Who?”

Ash jerked his head in the direction of the empty chairs right in the first row, the ones that were expressly for those closest to the deceased. “Dawson’s brother.”

“Estranged brother,” Cain corrected as they came within earshot. He had been watching the open door like a hawk ever since he’d arrived, and Ash could tell he was nearing the end of his patience. “All things considered, he has to be, don’t you think? Maybe he just…I don’t know, doesn’t want to come? Dysfunctional families and all that, right? Hell, maybe Mecha admin doesn’t even know he exists. It’s not like they live together, and Professor Dawson’s always been a private person.”

They weren’t totally implausible suggestions, but there was too much against them, too much left to chance if Ash accepted any of them.

And if there was one thing in the universe that Ash trusted even less than appearances, it was chance.

“It doesn’t matter what I think,” he said at length, crossing his arms. “What I know is that he isn’t here, even though he literally should have nowhere more important to be, and neither is Arthur.”

“Who says I’m not here?”

Ash’s bones hardened to stone, as if that would keep that voice from corroding through him like sulfuric acid.

God, the bastard really gave new meaning to the phrase ‘Speak of the devil’, didn’t he?

“Oh, fantastic Ash; you conjured him,” Shorter quipped as all three of them turned to face Arthur. He sashayed out of the bathroom behind them, one lackey on each side, and smarmy grin wide on his face, the picture of relaxed arrogance.

“I hate that I’m kind of relieved,” Ash growled.

“Got a problem, boys?” Arthur asked, head tilted in mock-confusion, a vile smugness glinting in his eyes.

“We have plenty,” Shorter snapped. “But we won’t have any more so long as you and your weasels act right.”

Arthur laughed then, nails on a chalkboard. “Oh, we plan to.”

And that, that had Ash’s instincts screeching ‘Mayday! Mayday!’ for all they were worth.

Because guys like Arthur were always a little too sure of themselves, all tough talk and hollow bluster. They carried themselves with the air of magpies who thought themselves pterodactyls, and as wary as Ash was of them, they’d ceased to truly frighten over the years.

At least, when things were business as usual.

But on days like these, when they gleamed with cruel glee like Arthur was doing now, it meant that they had done, or were about to do something truly fearsome.

Question was, what?

Ash raised an eyebrow, opened his mouth to demand an elaboration, but Professor Meredith spoke before he could, trying to bring the gathering to heel.

“Okay, everyone; we’re beginning the service now! If you could please take your seats!”

Shorter had to pry Ash out of the standoff with Arthur, and he walked reluctantly behind him and Cain as they went to sit down. Thankfully, Alex, Bones and Kong had saved them places by the window. The trio began to make whispered conversation with Shorter and Cain, but Ash tuned them out, his eyes staying on Arthur as he went to the other side of the room to join his group.

Huh, that was strange, there were fewer of them than usual.

Ash frowned. He knew Arthur’s circle was more porous than his own; people came and went, hung around him for a few weeks and then disappeared from his network entirely, but if there was one constant, one person who was always around Arthur, it was—

Ash’s breath hitched; he felt like someone had knocked him upside the head with a brick.

Of all the people to not be here, how could he have missed—

His chair rattled as he bolted up off it. “Hey Arthur!” he called across the room, ignoring the way all heads turned to stare at him. “Where’s Wookie?”

Arthur’s head snapped in his direction, and Ash could see in the way the jerk’s eyes narrowed that he’d figured him out. But Ash could also see in the way Arthur’s mouth contorted that it was too late.

“Pfft,” Arthur sneered. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

And just like that, everything imploded into darkness.

“Son of a bitch!”

Ash cried out along with the rest of the room, one disoriented voice in a cacophony of many. A frenzy of scraping chairs and rustling clothes ensued as everyone fought to get to their feet and pull out their phones, grasping for any shred of light in the pitch blackness.

“Stay put!” Ash said to his friends, tapping Shorter’s arm to give him a sense of where he was. “It’ll only make things worse if you run around!”

What was going on? Did Arthur have Wookie trip the breakers in the building? Or did…

Ash’s eyes darted to the window to check, and his heart thundered like it was getting claustrophobic inside his own chest.

There was nothing out there but looming inky silhouettes of buildings, ones that haemorrhaged into the abyss of the sky. Not a thing to be seen except the sentinel stars, spectating dispassionately as scream upon scream rang out of the darkness, doors banging and glass breaking in disconcerting harmony as the incessant braying of alarms fought to dominate the soundscape.

Shit. It wasn’t just the Mecha building; it wasn’t just the Academy; it was all of Wolfsbane.

All of Wolfsbane had lost power.

Well, almost all of it.

Looking closer now, Ash saw two glimmering structures cresting the horizon, and it didn’t take a genius to figure out what those places were.

The power plant where Dawson’s brother worked, and the water treatment plant where Arthur worked.

He shook his head. So, this had been their play the whole time. No wonder they’d been laying low these past couple of weeks. He should’ve known; he should’ve fucking known.

He felt a rage-anxiety cocktail building like a wave in his gut, but he forced himself to tamp it down. It wouldn’t do to lose his temper now. No, that he would do when he got his hands on Arthur.

Because so help him God, Ash was going after him, even though he could barely see his own hand in front of his face.

He stood firm in his place, trying to regain some sense of direction. Where had Arthur been standing before the lights went out? Where would he go?

Ash listened intently, trying to isolate helpful sounds from the mayhem around him.

His friends’ fumbling next to him. The futile platitudes of the professors as they tried to regain some semblance of order. Thudding.

Boots…boots on concrete. Lots of it as people rushed about, trying to get their bearings, but one pair, separating from the mass and running towards…

Towards them. Single-minded and unhesitant.

Ash tensed, crouching into a defensive stance.

Where was the person?

Somewhere by his left, his eight—no, his ten o’clock.

He swivelled his body a little, trying to look in what he thought was the right direction, but the attacker gave him no time to formulate a plan. Two more seconds and their panting breaths were already too close, and it was all Ash could do to shout, “Watch out!” before a sickening thunk sounded from right next to him, and Shorter crumpled to the floor with a startled yelp.

Ash’s blood thrummed in his veins, and he whirled around just as a swing was being taken to the back of his head. He caught the assailant’s wrist just in time, digging his nails into their skin as viciously as he could.

And when they squawked and dropped whatever weapon they had, Ash realized what a coward Arthur truly was.

Coming at them in the dark and from behind? God, that was low, even for him.

“Well, what d’you know, the Lynx does have claws after all,” Arthur’s voice spat as he dealt Ash a punch in his face with his free hand, sending him reeling into the chairs in the row before theirs.

“Arthur!” Ash scrambled to his feet and darted after him blindly.

He couldn’t let the bastard get away. Only God knew what Arthur would do if he did, and Ash was not interested in finding out.

His eyes were slowly getting used to the darkness, but they couldn’t do it fast enough, and he clutched his bruised cheek as his senses chased Arthur’s frantic strides through the crowd.

Somewhere up ahead, he heard the squeak of the door opening and swore, willing his legs to work faster, elbowing people out of the way as he ran for the sole way out of the room, one hand outstretched to grab onto the back of Arthur’s shirt.

But it was no use, his body crashed into wood, and Ash heard Arthur’s victorious laughter ringing out from the other side of the door.

Oh, they were properly screwed now.

Ash banged on it with a fist, then threw his shoulder against it a couple of times in frustration. But it refused to budge, clattering in its hinges but still staying shut.

“It’s no use!” Cain came to him from out of the shadows, the light of his phone illuminating the top half of his face. “He must’ve had Wookie out there waiting to barricade it the moment he got out. Let him go; we’ve got bigger problems.”

“Is Shorter alright?” Ash inquired, his stomach dropping like a stone.

“Just bleeding,” Cain assured, leading him back to where their friends were, huddled by the window to access what little light bled in from the night sky, the glare from their phone screens washing them grey.

Ash reached into his pocket for his own phone as he came upon Shorter’s sitting form, clicking a button to get the screen to light up. He shined it into his friend’s face, and Shorter batted at his hand.

“Stop it already, I’m fine,” he grumbled, one hand full of Kong’s hoodie as he pressed it to the side of his head in an attempt to staunch the blood.

“He doesn’t have a concussion, but we need to get him patched up before he loses any more blood,” Alex said worriedly, squatting on one side of him. He looked up at Bones, who was waving his phone around above his head. “The hell are you doing, call Nadia; we need to get him home!”

“I can’t!” Bones replied, his voice rising to a fever pitch. “My phone’s got no bars!”

Cain inhaled sharply as he surveyed the scene outside the window.

“Don’t tell me the fucking cell towers are out of commission too,” Cain murmured, rust and grim trepidation tinging his tone.

Ash brought his phone screen up to his face then, trying to move fast despite the adrenaline inducing tremors in his hands. Sure enough, there was no signal.

His heart sank, weighed down by thorns.

He couldn’t call Max. Or Jess. Or Charlie. There’d be no reinforcements from the adults.

He…he was alone.

And—Oh, God, Eiji. He couldn’t check on Eiji.

When last they’d texted, Eiji had said he was staying home tonight, dye-making, but even still—

“That’s impossible!” Kong shrieked, shocking Ash out of his thoughts. “The towers—they have backup generators there’s no way—”

“Yes, there is,” Ash cut in. “If you’ve got a high-level operative at the power plant on your side.”

He pointed to the distant buildings outside that still miraculously had their electricity, and Shorter groaned, even as Cain smacked a palm on his forehead.

“This was their plan all along,” Ash gritted out, not even caring now that Alex, Bones and Kong were listening in.

What point was there in keeping anyone out of it, when Arthur had so maliciously dragged all of them into it?

“They needed to force a settlement-wide emergency to do whatever the fuck they were going to do, so all the crisis services would be tied up with helping people and no one would have the fucking bandwidth to go after them. And what could be more of an emergency than a blackout?”

“Then whatever’s happening is happening at the water treatment plant,” Cain deduced. “It’s the only other place that’s still got electricity, and it’s the only reason you-know-who’d have to involve a cheap punk like Arthur. He works there.”

“Which means he’s got an access card for pretty much every machine in the building,” Shorter said, stumbling to his feet even as Alex put out an arm to support him. He looked urgently to Ash then, icicles clinging to every word. “We gotta get to him, Ash. I don’t know what he’s trying to do, but the way this is going, he could decimate the whole settlement.”

“He won’t,” Ash promised Shorter, promised himself. “He fucking won’t. We’re going to stop him.”

He’d be damned if he let Arthur rip away everything his friends had ever known; he’d be damned if he let some asshole on an ego trip rip away from him the only sanctuary he’d ever known; he’d be damned if he let anything happen to this place that Eiji loved so much.

Alex quirked a brow at him. “And how do you propose we do that? Dude literally locked us in here. Whatever’s blocking the door, I doubt it’s going to give.”

That was true enough, but Ash allowed himself a grin.

Sure, he was useless with a potato peeler, and didn’t articulate his feelings very well, and painted like a toddler, but if there was one thing he could do well, it was problem-solve.

“Well, you know what they say about doors. When they close, a window opens.”

Alex’s eyes widened as Ash’s meaning dawned on him, and he cast a dubious glance at the rectangular hole in the wall before them, their only way out. “No.”

Ash dragged a chair over to the nearest wall in response, using his phone to light the way. Climbing up onto it, he felt around for the string lights, and when his hands closed around the wire, proceeded to yank it off. “Yes.”

“Ash!”

“You got a better idea?” Ash threw back, irritated.

God, this was not the time to dither. If they thought too much, the fear would get the better of them, and Ash knew just how paralysing that could be.

No. They had to move, and they had to move now, if they were going to stand any chance at all.

He waited for someone to argue with him, but no one did, so he tied one end of the wire around his waist, and tugged as hard as he could to make sure that the wire wouldn’t break when strained by his weight.

He cheered silently when it held. Bless Mecha and their excellent wires.

“You think this wire is long enough to go all the way down to the ground?” Shorter asked as Ash made his way to the window. “We’re fifteen floors up.”

“Who said anything about going all the way to the ground?” Ash shrugged. “Mecha’s got a window every three floors; we’ll just bust into the room right under this one on the twelfth floor and get to the stairwell from there. I doubt Arthur had the time to board up every room in the building.”

“But then what? We bike to the plant?”

“We don’t have to,” Cain chimed in, whipping out a jangle of keys from one of his pockets. “Combat’s got armoured Humvees in the garage, and it’s about time I abused my power as an upperclassman. I can drive us.”

“Sounds like a plan to me,” Shorter grinned as Ash threw one leg over the windowsill. “Let’s get this shit shaking then. I call shotgun.”

Ash smiled at him ruefully.

Of course, it was Shorter who was the most up for this. Of course, it was him making wisecracks above the tick-tick-ticking of the time-bomb on their hands. Of course, it was him staring head-on into the face of unreliable dark.

Riverbed rock in the middle of rapids; cast iron in an inferno.

Which was exactly why Ash said, “No, me and Cain will go. You don’t come with.”

Shorter glared at him, and Ash could not stop looking at the trickle of blood that had dried on the side of his face where Arthur had hit him. “I told you I’m fine. And you’re crazy if you think I’m just going to sit on my ass while your unhinged butt is out there, getting—”

“You’re hurt; you should be sitting on your ass,” Ash countered. Shorter almost looked insulted, but Ash then punched him lightly in the shoulder. “So, sit your ass into your spaceplane, and watch our backs instead. We’ve got a better shot at taking Arthur down if we split up.”

He handed Shorter the other end of the wire. “I…I trust you. Brother.”

Shorter chuckled helplessly, then wrapped the wire tightly around four of his fingers. “Alright fine. You win, this time. Now, get moving, Lynx. We've got a rodent to hunt."

Ash bumped fists with him, then drew in a deep breath as he looked down. In some ways he was glad had zero-adjacent visibility.

It was easier to rappel down the side of the building when he couldn’t see how far he had to fall if the wire around his waist snapped.

He somersaulted through the twelfth-floor window, and quickly undid the wire from around his waist so Shorter could pull it back up. He kicked through the door of the office he’d fallen into, then went back to the window to wait for Cain to come down.

And it was while he was standing there, staring into the void of the Wolfsbane settlement that Ash saw it.

A single red fireball arcing through the sky with a pop and fizzle and a tail of smoke.

Ash gaped at it; he tried to speak, tried to tell his friends, but his words were stolen away. And before he could make sense of it another fireball shot into the sky, then another, then another.

Red, white, yellow. One singular, two others in pairs, wading through the gloom and illuminating the area below as they went.

A collection of substitute suns, to redeem the moonless night.

“Holy fuck.”

Ash stepped out of the way as Cain tumbled in through the window, landing awkwardly on his ass.

“Cain, what the—”

“Parachute flares,” Cain finished before Ash could say more, gazing out in awe at the lights as they shattered the dense shadows. They looked on as more went up every second, almost as if they were playing off each other, transmitting some type of secret message. “Shit, I—I’d heard the rumours, but I’d never thought they’d actually gone through with it; that they’d actually gotten their hands on—”

“Who?” Ash asked, bewildered.

“The Vitae kids.”

Ash’s heart stuttered in his chest.

“Flares and fireworks are profoundly illegal on Earth, on account of air pollution.” Cain pointed to the charcoal trails of smoke the fireballs left in their wake. “But Academy legend had it that Vitae hoarded the last ones, even taught their students how to make them, for what reason nobody knew. But I guess we do now.”

Right then, a trio of green flashes shot up from a familiar direction, moving comet-like over the top of an apartment building that Ash recognized, and he choked on his own breath.

There was only one person who could’ve fired from there.

Eiji.

“The Vitae are organizing,” Cain marvelled. “They’re going to chase away the dark.”

Well, fuck. So much for Ash’s hope that Eiji would be safe, ensconced away from this mess.

Every fibre of his being railed against his better sense; he wanted nothing more than to race straight towards Eiji, to hide him away in his arms, to implore him to please not go out into the pandemonium where he could get hurt.

But Ash talked himself off that ledge as the wire before him was pulled back up by Shorter, and the latter announced that he’d be lowering himself down next.

Tearing himself in two would not help now. The best way to protect Eiji would be to take Arthur out.

Resolved, he turned to Cain and said, “Let’s move. We’ve wasted too much time already.”

Cain nodded gravely, and with that they both broke into a sprint.

Their phones lit the way ahead of them as they barrelled out of the room and down the stairwell, and vaguely it occurred to Ash that they should monitor their battery life to make sure that the devices didn’t conk off on them. His own was at 78%, which quelled his fears some, but he made a mental note to keep checking, as he made one to watch for any indication of a cell phone signal.

He knew Max would likely be beside himself with worry right now, and of course, he felt guilty for rushing away from his family instead of towards them, but he also felt like he had no other choice.

Max and Jess had spent more than a decade protecting him. Ash felt it only right that he return the favour.

He thought about this as he buckled himself into the passenger seat of Cain’s Humvee, lurching forwards regardless as Cain turned sharply out of the parking spot.

“Hold on!” Cain said as they hurtled towards the closed doors of the garage. They were electric, so there was no way to open them right now, and Ash put up his hands in front of his face automatically as the car’s front smashed through them on their way out.

“Fucking hell,” Ash gulped when they emerged, taking in twice as much air as was shocked out of his lungs.

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Cain snickered, even as he switched on the headlights and wheeled towards the Academy gates.

Ash rolled his eyes but settled into his seat determinedly.

They were finally in business.

---

It had been Ash’s idea to cut through the Woodlands.

“It’ll be the last direction they’ll expect us to come from,” he’d told Cain when the guy had side-eyed him.

“Yeah, ‘cause of the rabid jungle cats,” Cain reminded, steering the Humvee to the very edge of the road. “We won’t get eaten, but we are going to have a problem if they jump in front of the car.”

Ash waved the concern away. “If my hunch is right, they’ll be the least of our problems.”

“This better not backfire, Lynx.”

“Feel free to toss me out the car if it does.”

The car veered off the road the moment the words left Ash’s lips and, and internally, he patted himself on the back.

Cain, Ash was learning, only listened to people who were brave enough to put their own skin in the game.

On that front, Ash supposed, they were one and the same.

He rolled up his window as the car ploughed through the undergrowth, cutting down ferns and sling-shotting branches back into the windshield as it squeezed between the bigger trees. It was far from quiet here, what with the sputtering of their own engine and the swishing of the leaves as they parted to make way for the Humvee, but Ash was still unnerved.

He felt like there was something missing, like it was devoid of things that belonged there.

He unbuckled his seatbelt, and sat up straighter, trying to see out of the windshield.

“There.” Ash drew Cain’s attention to a trail on the left, a snaking path that was barer than the rest of the forest floor, verdure no doubt eroded away by human shoes traversing this area over and over again. “Go down that way.”

Cain craned his neck, then turned the steering wheel towards it. “Do you think it leads to the water treatment plant?”

“It has to. Max saw multiple power plant employees disappearing into this part of the Woodlands, and I think it’s safe to say they weren’t coming by to pet the kitties,” Ash reasoned. “This must’ve been a rendezvous location, or—”

“Or something much weirder.”

The gravel in Cain’s voice did not go unnoticed by Ash, and he followed his gaze to the fringes of the headlights’ purview.

The first things Ash registered were the steel bars, thick enough to knit together into impenetrable cages. And within those cages, there lay the famed jungle cats of the Woodlands, not tamed but broken.

Panthers and bobcats, mostly. Some of them sitting listless and glassy-eyed, uncomprehending as the car passed them by. Others laying on their sides, tongue lolling out and mouth bruised with purple, too static to be drawing breath. And still others, their corpses desecrated, gaping holes where brains were supposed to be.

Ash felt bile rise up his throat. So, this was where all the leopards had gone.

“The cages,” Cain rasped, cracking the window open despite the stench. “They’re tagged with something.”

Huh. So, they were.

Ash read off the labels as the car cruised along, the cats getting progressively livelier as they went down the line of cages.

Interesting. They were not set up in any chronological order, but Ash noted some similarities right away.

For one thing, all the cages with the dead leopards were tagged BANANA1. These ones were all missing brains.

For another, all the cages with unbrutalized corpses were tagged BANANA2. These ones didn’t smell as strong, and still had remnants of raw meat in their feeding bowls, so their deaths must’ve been relatively recent.

But neither of these things was what ultimately tied Ash’s insides into balloon animals.

No, what did him in were the cages with the dazed cats, the ones who lived, but lived like puppets, the ones who appeared to be trapped in a nebulous, mute suffering.

The ones whose cages were tagged BANANA FISH.

And that was when Ash finally put the pieces together.

“He’s gonna put it in the water,” Ash mumbled, aghast. He looked to Cain, who was white-knuckling the steering wheel in an attempt to maintain some shred of composure. “Whatever that BANANA thing is, Golzine’s people have perfected it, and Arthur’s going to use Dawson’s FISH nanotech to put it in the water. You said the resistance didn’t know what it was; that they thought it was some type of surveillance system. But what if it wasn’t for surveillance? What if it was for drug delivery?”

“We should’ve brought a gun,” Cain laughed bitterly. “If you’re right, then Arthur needs to be put the fuck down.”

Ash didn’t have the stomach to second that assertion. What would it make them if they started dealing out death and judgement like that?

No better, that’s what.

No, if anyone was going to make Arthur pay, it was—

It was the jungle cats.

They were the ones who had been caged; tortured, harvested like they didn’t matter. They were the ones who were being driven to extinction.

And as they drove by the untagged cages, Ash saw in his mind’s eye just how he could make that happen.

“We won’t need a gun,” he said slyly, and turned to Cain. “Slow down.”

Cain looked at him like he’d asked for both his kidneys. “What?”

“Slow down. Don’t stop the car, but slow us down enough for me to get out.”

“The fuck are you getting out for?!” Cain exclaimed. His body went taut, but he slowed to a crawl, nonetheless.

And Ash smiled, fire and brimstone. “I’m getting us an army.”

Cain caught his drift then, for in that moment he also caught sight of the gigantic hammer used for disciplining the poor creatures lying on the ground up ahead, along with the trough of raw meat used for feeding, and his eyes blew wide. “Ash! This is an insane—Ash, don’t—Ash!”

But Ash was already out of the car, already running to grab the tongs in the feeding trough and hauling the biggest hunk of meat into the truck bed of the Humvee. The odour was practically debilitating now, excrement and rot and acrid horror all mixed together, but Ash pressed on, wobbling on his feet as he went for the hammer next. Using it, he smashed the lock on every untagged cage, every cage which boasted a fierce, hungry cat that hadn’t yet been experimented on.

Ash broke open six cages, the animals roaring and hissing at him as he did, equal parts frightened and enraged. All it took was for Ash’s form to stop blocking their view of the world outside, and they were all shoving past the doors to freedom.

“God, Ash, for fuck’s sake, that’s enough, get back in here!” Cain yelled out as Ash dropped the hammer and dashed for his still-open car door, six half-starved panthers snapping at his heels.

He managed to make it just in time, the car door a hair’s breadth away from closing on the whiskers of one particularly delirious panther. The second he was inside, Cain floored the accelerator, not at all keen on having any of the animal’s friends throw themselves at the car in their frenzy to feed.

“You must have some sort of death wish,” Cain remarked, taking in the terrifying ensemble of teeth and fur and ferocity chasing them, drawn by the enticing smell of the raw meat.

Ash wheezed on the seat next to him, hair plastered to his face with sweat and limbs jittery with exertion.

It didn’t take a death wish to do what he’d just done; the lives of everyone he’d ever cared about were on the line. What more incentive did he need?

He opened his mouth to say something, but was jolted halfway out of his seat by the harsh trilling of a cell phone.

His cell phone.

“What the—” Cain began as Ash dug around in his pockets in search of it, astonished to find three bars in the corner of the screen, and Max’s name front and centre.

God, never had Ash been happier to see that contact flash on his phone.

Hastily, he accepted the call and pressed the thing to his ear.

“Max?”

“Ash!” Max sounded like he’d been bellowing for hours. “Kiddo, where the fuck are you?!”

“Never mind that; since when has the phone signal been back?”

“It just got going again,” Alex’s voice came through the line as Ash put the phone on speaker, and Ash could swear he almost seemed proud of himself. “Bones and Kong got some of the ground crew together, biked over to the towers, kicked the ever-loving shit out of some random thugs and turned the spare generators back on.”

“Alex?” Cain asked, equally as thrown as Ash. “You’re with Max?”

“No, I’m up in the ATC tower; we’re on conference call,” Alex informed. “Thought I’d hang back to keep Shorter in the loop while he brings the plane around to the water treatment plant. He’s taxiing as we speak.”

“Alex told me you put quite the plan in motion,” Max said, clearly addressing Ash. “Care to let your old man in on whatever the fuck is going on?”

Ash suddenly felt very tired. So much had happened that they absolutely had no time to go into right now. “Me and Cain are a couple of minutes out from the water treatment plant,” he settled on saying.

“Us, and about half a dozen panthers,” Cain added most unhelpfully, causing Max to shriek.

“Panthers?! What in the name of Lucifer are you two doing with—”

“Focus, Max,” Ash groused, too on edge. “Arthur’s probably already there; I can’t get into it now, but he’s going to put some kinda drug or poison in the water. Hopefully we’ll catch him before he gets the chance to.”

“Alright, I’ll grab Shunichi and Jess and get down there right now.”

“No!” Ash said immediately. “It’d be too late; me and Cain are here already.”

“You’ll need backup.”

“Shorter’s our backup, Max,” Ash said, trying to keep the annoyance out of his voice, trying to temper Max’s hysterics. “If you want to go somewhere, go to the power plant. Keep Arthur’s backup from coming after us.”

“Get Shorter to do that; I’m coming to you!”

“Be reasonable, old man; the spaceplane’s got way more destructive power than you do; it’s more use to us here! And nobody knows the power plant better that you.”

“I said no!”

Okay. Ash had officially had it.

“And I’m saying I’m not a stupid child; I can handle this, Max, so back off for once!”

Thirty seconds of excruciating silence, then Max’s voice came over the line again, fractured knives and gutted pillows.

“Take me off speaker, Ash.”

It jarred Ash so much that he had no choice but to comply.

“You know who the last person to say that to me was?” Max said the moment the phone was against Ash’s ears again. “Griffin.”

A fissure opened inside Ash’s chest, all the ire draining out of him. It’d been so long since Max had spoken his name. Ash got the feeling it filled Max’s lungs with oceanwater every time he tried. “Max, look, I—”

“My best friend died because I backed off, Aslan. I won’t make that mistake again. It’s my job to watch your back.”

“You’ve done that my whole life, Max. You and Jess both have,” Ash spoke, barely above a whisper. “You don’t need to do it anymore. Let me take care of this for you. I’m grown now, and I owe you anyway.”

“You’re sixteen, punk, as far as I’m concerned, you’re still a baby. And while we’re on that, you don’t owe us shit, kiddo,” Max argued vehemently, somehow still managing to be consoling. “You’re our son.”

Ash closed his eyes, trying to keep his tears from spilling, trying to keep the nails in his clenched fist from breaking skin.

“I…I know, Max,” he said, weak and reedy. “I’ve always known, but I can’t believe it. Not just yet. I’m trying to, though. Why do you think I’m doing this?”

Max seemed to be at a loss for words then, but for Ash things were crystal clear, no matter what way Max tried to slice it.

If he was a favour, then he was only returning the kindness he’d been shown. His life in the crossfire in exchange for all the times Max and Jess had put theirs in danger for him.

And if he was a son, then he was only doing his duty. Sons defended their families, didn’t they?

“Alright, kiddo,” Max said finally. “I’ll let you have this one. But this is one singular extenuating time-sensitive circumstance, okay? Next time, we go together, or not at all.”

Ash laughed thickly. “Thank you, Max.”

And with that, Max dropped off the call, evidently to rally the troops and head out to the power plant.

Ash put the phone on speaker once more. “When we get to water treatment plant, everyone stays on the conference call together. That’ll serve as our comms line,” he instructed, coughing as he stuffed the rest of his emotional baggage back down his throat. “Can Shorter hear us okay?”

“Affirmative,” Shorter’s voice chirped, and Ash guessed Alex had held his phone to his mic up in the air traffic control tower. “What do you got for me?”

“Just stay out of sight and head for the disinfection tank. Worst comes to worst, we’re gonna need you there.”

“Roger. ETA two minutes forty-seven seconds.”

“Right.” Ash looked then to Cain, who made eye-contact somewhat stiffly, no doubt just as embarrassed as him in the aftermath of the conversation with Max. But he was alert and committed to the cause, which was all that Ash could ask for anyway.

“Lure the cats into the nearest enclosed space among the tanks and keep them there. I’ll find a way to bring Arthur to them. He’s going to bleed for the mess he’s made tonight.”

---

When they pulled up to the water treatment plant, Arthur and his goons barely had time to run.

Ash counted nine brutes as the Humvee exited the Woodlands and made for the gates of the facility. They were lounging by their bicycles, armed with pipes, bats and other miscellaneous club-like weapons, even as Arthur strolled out of one of the control buildings, hands in his pockets.

He nearly tripped over himself when he saw the car, blasting past the closed gates as if they were made of matchsticks.

“Hey boys, mind if we crash your party?” Cain jeered, poking his head out of the driver side window. “We brought some friends.”

Arthur balked, turning green as he caught sight of the panthers, bounding towards him and his lackeys, foaming at the mouth and murderous intent flinty in their eyes. His goons scattered in terror. Their bikes were abandoned as they fled from the three panthers who’d broken away from the main group because they’d decided that said goons would be tastier than raw meat.

That left Arthur to fend for himself.

Frustrated, he snarled, “Oh, no you don’t!” and his hand moved to reach for something tucked into the back of his pants.

Ash’s heart leapt into his mouth.

Gun. The bastard had a gun.

His brain instantly ran the possibilities. There wasn’t much space to speed around inside the compound, the leviathan tanks of water too close together for comfort. Two more minutes of driving and Cain would be forced to slow down.

It’d be child’s play for Arthur to blow out the Humvee’s tyres if he started shooting.

And then they’d all be sitting ducks for the panthers.

No. Ash had to get to him before he fired a single round.

He couldn’t get much more than a “Stick to the plan!” out before he popped the car door open and rolled out. His palms scraped over concrete as he pushed himself up and broke into a run, veering away from both the panthers and the car, zigzagging between the hefty pipes that led from the tanks into the ground.

Somewhere behind him Ash heard a peeved Cain screaming, “You have got to stop doing that!”, but he ignored it, entirely too focused on the semi-automatic handgun that had now appeared in Arthur’s hand.

He saw Arthur falter, just as he had expected. There were too many targets: Ash, Cain, the car, the panthers; Arthur didn’t know where to shoot first.

And it was this that Ash took advantage of, going for Arthur’s knees and knocking him to the ground before he could make a decision.

A stray shot went off as Arthur crumpled, and Ash cursed as he heard a sharp metallic ping behind him. But he didn’t have the time to worry about that, because the gun was still in Arthur’s hand, and he was already trying to bring it around to point at Ash.

But Ash never gave him a chance, holding down Arthur’s thrashing body with a knee pressed into his belly. He pinned Arthur’s face to the tarmac with one hand and went to wrest the gun from his grasp with the other, and that was when Arthur glared up at him, mangled smile on his face.

“You’re too late, Lynx,” he laughed harshly. “BANANA FISH is already in the disinfectant cocktail, and there’s nothing you can do about it.”

Ash flinched. The pressure he was putting on Arthur’s body eased for a split second, and Arthur tried to fire off another round. But Ash slammed his wrist back down before he could even take aim, not even a little remorseful when he heard the crack of his finger bones.

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that,” Ash said, his voice snake venom and kerosene fumes.

Because he knew enough about industrial water treatment to know that it took five whole hours for the water to get anywhere near ready to leave the plant, and it sure as hell hadn’t been long enough for that.

Which meant that the situation was still salvageable. They could fix this before the contaminated water was distributed to the settlements.

Arthur’s hand was limp now, which meant that Ash could take the gun off him no problem. He pistol-whipped the side of Arthur’s head to stall him, tossed the gun away from his body, then promptly lifted himself off him and began to run towards where he’d last seen Cain and the cats.

“Shorter, come in!” he yelled into his phone.

“Yes, bitch. You rang?” Shorter’s voice crackled playfully over the line, and despite it all Ash found himself rolling his eyes.

“Don’t call me ‘bitch’,” he grunted, even as he heard Arthur’s footsteps start back up behind him. “Worst has come to worst; you need to break the pipes between the disinfection tank and the distribution tankers.”

“Copy.”

No sooner had Shorter said the words, Ash heard the clicking of the gun safety being disabled. He darted around a corner as fast as he could, a mere three seconds before a bullet whizzed past his ears.

He risked a look over his shoulder, only to find Arthur giving chase, right hand dangling uselessly as he attempted to shoot at Ash with his left.

Good. That meant the bullets would be much easier to dodge.

Ash forced himself to run faster, fighting to breathe as he brought his phone to his ears yet again. “Cain! Where’re you at?”

“Over by the distribution tankers! Between Tank C, D and E,” Cain answered, and Ash fought back the wave of nausea that came from hearing the thunks in the background of his voice; the cats were probably hurling themselves at the car in an effort to get at the meat now. “Think you can make it?”

Ash looked up at a storage tank as he went past it, monstrous and imposing and labelled with a big blue H.

“I have to,” Ash croaked, steeling himself. “When I say, open the door for me.”

“Got it.”

Another bullet buried itself in a pipe that was a foot from Ash, and he screamed out into the wind, if for no other reason than to get his stupid protesting lungs and seizing muscles to shut up about the strain he was putting on his body.

He knew well enough that he’d crossed his own limits five minutes ago.

But he didn’t have a choice.

If he didn’t want the maniac behind him to put a bullet in his back, then he had to keep going, had to keep dodging and listening and moving forward. Because the primal part of Ash that knew nothing other than survival was far harder to kill than the rest of him, and right now it was that part that held his proverbial reigns.

His thoughts had whittled down to the essential.

There was nothing else but the ground beneath his feet, the threat of Arthur behind him and the maze of tankers and pipes boxing him in.

Run. Inhale. Listen.

Swerve. Exhale. Duck.

Live.

On the edge of oblivion; one foot in front of the other; one breath after another.

Like Ash had always done.

He almost wept when he saw the bulk of the Humvee up ahead of him. It was surrounded by the panthers, but he scarcely had to worry about them. Because the moment Arthur saw the animals, he began shooting at them instead of Ash, which instantly got them to disperse.

“Cain! Now!” Ash shouted, and the next second the passenger side door of the Humvee swung open. Ash dove into the vehicle gratefully, slamming the door shut just as a bullet bounced off the back of the side-view mirror.

Ash wiped the sweat from his forehead with his shirtsleeve and glanced over at Cain. It was unsettling the way Cain looked back at him, as if with a new kind of respect.

As if Ash deserved to be respected not just as a brilliant peer, but as a brilliant leader.

He was suddenly gripped with a visceral desire to shrink away from the implications of that.

Thankfully, Ash did not have to wallow in the feeling for long, because at that moment, an excited voice echoed throughout the plant.

“We interrupt your regularly scheduled programming to bring you this very special message!”

Ash smiled to himself just as a familiar spaceplane zoomed out of the night sky, flying entirely too fast for this altitude. He couldn’t remember now why he’d allowed Shorter to talk him into installing a PA system into Moby Dick.

Arthur dropped his gun with an ungainly squeak and threw himself down on his stomach, in accordance with ground-strafing defence protocol.

Ash knew Arthur was expecting Shorter to shoot at him, or indeed shoot at the panthers, but to his dismay Shorter did neither, shooting instead at the piping between the disinfection tank and the distribution tankers until it was reduced to mesh.

“You’ve been dickmatized!” Shorter proclaimed. “Better luck next time. Bitch.”

Arthur screamed like burning tyres on asphalt as the water gushed out of the destroyed pipes and pooled around the tankers, and Ash saw all the jackass’ delusions of grandeur wash away along with it. Just as Ash saw the blood drain from Arthur’s face when he realized that the panthers had recovered from the events enough to turn their ravenous gazes upon his prostrate form once more.

“Our work here is done,” Ash told the conference call, raising his voice so he’d be heard above the cats’ roars as they pounced upon Arthur. “Let’s go the hell home.”

Everyone chorused their assent, and Ash fell back into his seat as Cain drove them out of there and Shorter flew back to the Academy. He watched passively through the side-view mirror as one of the panthers sunk its teeth into Arthur’s broken hand behind him, ripping the man’s fingers off before slumping abruptly onto its side.

Ash didn’t even register Arthur’s cries when it happened. Just the panther’s yowl when it was shot.

Huh, it seemed like Arthur’s goons had gotten their act together enough to finally launch a counterattack. Ash wondered briefly where they’d gotten their guns. It hadn’t seemed like they’d had those before.

Oh well. He couldn’t think about that right now.

He turned away as the rest of the panthers were gunned down; he didn’t want to see any more jungle cats slaughtered. Matter of fact, there was nothing and nobody else that Ash wanted to see for the rest of tonight.

Nobody but Eiji.

He needed to make sure Eiji was okay.

---

It was a much brighter, much more orderly Wolfsbane that Ash returned to.

Ignited red road flares lined every street, to delineate the edges and lanes for commuters trying to get to their homes. Candle lanterns burned in every restaurant and storefront, and people gravitated towards them for spare food and blankets. Small, controlled fires were lit on every intersection, serving as meeting points for folks who hadn’t been able to find each other while the cell towers had been down. Every fifteen minutes a parachute flare went up over a different section of the settlement, providing them with bright light for ten minutes before it extinguished. Once in a while there would be a volley of whistles and hoots, courtesy of the older teenagers that sat atop the roofs of the buildings—presumably Vitae upperclassmen—trying to communicate with each other without depleting their phone batteries.

Ash gawked at it all from the back of Alex’s bike as they left the Academy behind them. After the fiasco at the water treatment plant, everyone had reconvened at the Mecha building. There was some cursory police presence there thanks to the professors, and considering what they’d just pulled, they didn’t want to stick around too long. Cain had volunteered to take Shorter home as soon as Moby Dick had been safely stowed away in the hangar; although the latter’s head wound had stopped bleeding, the first aid that Alex had administered could only do so much. He needed rest and proper medical attention, and Nadia already had all the supplies ready. Apparently, Jess had left Michael with her before she’d joined Max at the power plant, so they’d done the prep work together. Of course, Ash had checked in with Max right after they’d gotten that squared away and had been charged with going straight home.

It seemed that now that Plan A at the water treatment plant had failed, the groundwork for something else entirely was being laid at the power plant, and though it was by no means an emergency, Max hadn’t wanted to leave without doing some recon.

And in all honesty, Ash was too weary to protest. So, he’d accepted Alex’s offer to drop him back to his apartment. Ash would look for Eiji there first, seeing as how that was where he’d been when the lights had first gone out.

They moved at a snail’s pace; even with the Vitae kids’ efforts it was entirely too dark to go fast, what with all the potholes on the road. Not to mention, Alex was unused to cycling with someone on his bicycle’s carrier. Ash sat ramrod straight, despite how much he just wanted to sprawl forward and go to sleep.

Because it was Alex in front of him, not Eiji.

He was a good friend and as dependable as they came if tonight was any indication, but he was not Eiji. Ash was sure they’d fall over if he adjusted his posture even a little bit. Alex didn’t have Eiji’s balance, graceful and always unfazed by Ash’s extra weight on his back, by Ash’s arm around his waist. He didn’t have Eiji’s warmth, overwhelming without stifling. He didn’t have Eiji’s laughter, his lychee-lemon voice, saying, “Aslan, sit up, you big baby!”

Oh, Eiji.

Ash pulled out his phone to text him; hopefully he would see it now that the cell signal was up and running again.

But when he navigated to his and Eiji’s text chain, he was greeted with a barrage of anxious texts instead.

Aslan! Are you alright? I think there is a blackout! You are at the Mecha building for the memorial service, yes? Is everything okay there?

Aslan, I know the cell signal is down right now so you will not get this, but please call me when you do! Max and Jessica are not home, and I am worried!!

Are you hurt? I will come get you if you are. Just please, text me back.

‘No!’ Ash almost said out loud, starting to shake as he scrolled through the messages. ‘Stay where you are!’

Aslan where did you go? Is Shorter with you? I called Nadia, but she cannot reach you guys either.

‘Don’t put yourself in danger. Not for me.’ Ash didn’t know why he was saying these things in his own head. Eiji couldn’t hear him; Eiji probably didn’t even want to hear that. A particular memory of him came to the forefront of Ash’s mind, soft, sincere, hurricane-deflecting and soul-mending, guaranteeing, ‘You’re always going to be my override.’

Aslan, please answer. I must help with the Vitae response so I cannot stay in one place. It will be hard for us to find each other.

Tell me you are okay. I promise I will shut up if you do. Just tell me you are okay.

Please call. Text. Anything. I am scared, Aslan.

That last message had come in eight minutes ago, and Ash nearly dropped his phone in his hurry to text Eiji back.

God, he was such a jackass. He’d had cell phone service for a while now, and sure he’d been more than a little preoccupied for most of the night, but hell, he’d been doing absolutely nothing during the entire car ride back to the Academy.

Just lying there, half catatonic, trying to forget what the insides of cat skulls looked like and trying to remember specifically what blend of herbs and flowers Eiji smelled like, when he could have been replying to those texts.

How stupid of him. How stupid, irresponsible, fucking callous of him to—

“Holy—Alex? Alex, Ash, is that you?!”

Ash jumped, the half-hoarse shout catching his attention before he could hit ‘send’ on his message to Eiji. He looked up from his phone, only to find Sing rushing towards them from out of the darkness, a flashlight clutched in one hand.

“Sing!” Alex exclaimed, pulling the bike over to the side of the road even as he approached, utterly winded. “The hell are you doing running around; does Nadia know you’re out here?”

“Shut up, I’m a big boy; I don’t need her permission for every little thing,” Sing muttered, petulant as he caught his breath. “But yeah, she knows I’m fine. I was with some of my friends when the blackout hit. We were too far away from Chang Dai, so we went to Eiji’s instead. We needed somewhere to stay until the cell signal came back up.”

He pinned Ash with an accusing look then. “I’m out here because this one wasn’t answering his texts and it was freaking Eiji the hell out. He wanted to go look for you himself, but the Vitae kids needed him on deck, so I convinced him to let me do it instead.”

“I—I was gonna text him back,” Ash defended himself lamely. “I just saw the texts two seconds ago.”

Sing sighed, exasperated. “Yeah, I know you guys have had an…interesting night. Nadia clued me in. But right now, you need to come with me, Ash. Eiji’s waiting.”

Ash didn’t need to be told twice. Wordlessly, he slid off Alex’s bicycle carrier and bid his friend good night, turning down a nearby street with Sing while Alex headed off to his own house. They jogged for a few minutes, till they came upon one of the older eight-storey buildings.

“Just go straight up the fire escape, all the way to the roof,” Sing said, pointing to the let-down ladder that led up to the first platform, and the stairs beyond. “He’s there, with a few other Vitae kids.”

Ash nodded. “Thanks, Sing. I owe you one.”

Sing grinned bashfully. “No, you don’t, but you’re welcome anyway, Ash!”

And with that he was gone, retreating to the road that would take him back to Chang Dai. Ash drew in a deep breath then, gave his cramping leg muscles a pep talk, and began to climb. He took the steps two at a time, but still moved entirely too slow for his own liking. It was like every time he looked up there was one more platform, one more flight of stairs. At one point he even had the incredibly irrational thought that the universe was just extending his misery to punish him for not replying to Eiji’s texts. But just when Ash thought it would never end, he burst up onto the roof.

“Jeez,” he grumbled under his breath. “Why do they make so many fucking stairs—”

“Aslan? Aslan, oh my God, Aslan! Aslan!”

Oh, that voice.

That vanilla-coconut, jasmine-cognac, persimmon-nutmeg voice.

Ash would throw himself into an ocean if that voice sang from its depths. He would fly towards the sun if that voice bled out of the light. He would dive headfirst, eyes closed into a tornado if he heard that voice on the wind.

That voice that brought with it brandy-snap eyes and an effervescent sort of tranquillity that brooked no rival, that voice that was unmistakably Eiji’s.

Ash watched, half-frozen and spellbound as Eiji hurtled towards him; threw his arms around Ash’s neck with such a force that they keeled over and fell to the ground.

Not that Ash was complaining; he was content to ignore the sharp pain that shot up his spine when he landed on his back. He had Eiji in his arms, safe and smiling and insistently pressing his face into his chest, repeating, “You’re okay, you’re okay; I’m so glad you’re okay,” like he couldn’t get enough of Ash.

What else did he need?

Ash tucked his face into Eiji’s shoulder, too overcome to do much more than nod in reassurance and yank constantly at Eiji’s shirt to coax him closer.

Eventually though, Eiji picked himself up, and adjusted their bodies into a sitting position. “You’re hurt,” he observed, tracing around the bruise on Ash’s cheek with a gentle finger.

Ash pulled his hand away from it and placed on his shoulder instead. He didn’t want to tell it all, not to Eiji. He was the person Ash cared about most, and now he was the only one left who had not gotten involved in his perilous nonsense.

And Ash intended to keep it that way.

“Arthur was being Arthur,” he evaded, offering Eiji a smile. “It—it’s not important.”

Eiji seemed indignant on his behalf, upset that he’d been injured, and Ash had to look away in the face of all that righteous anger.

“I’m sorry,” he said, gaze lowered. “For not texting you back. I—I didn’t mean to scare you. It’s just that I—”

“It’s okay; it’s all okay, Aslan.” Eiji lifted his chin and smiled, soothing like a sandalwood salve. “Like you said, it is not important.” He bumped his forehead against Ash’s affectionately, and Ash felt his cheeks burn. “Not right now, anyway. You are safe, and we are together, so we will worry about explanations in the morning, yes?”

He was trying to blink away tears, but it didn’t work; one sneaked out anyway, and Ash wiped away before it could diminish his smile.

“Eiji.”

Ash had more to say; the words welled up inside him, anguished, relentless:

‘How do you do that?’

‘How do you forgive me when I don’t deserve it?’

‘How do you hold me like this, like I’m a blessing somehow?’

‘How do you say my name like that, like it tastes better than plums, better than ambrosia, better than summer sunshine?’

So many words, but Ash didn’t have the courage to say them.

Quiet, petty, coward. Fidgeting on the edge of a cliff instead of diving off it, just like Eiji had said. A true child of the space colonies.

“Eiji,” he said again, and he knew he was begging now.

‘Undo me.’

‘I don’t want to be a Starboy anymore; I don’t want to be a coward.’

‘You are life on Earth, aren’t you?’

‘Accept me. Show me how to be fearless, like you are.’

Eiji cooed at him, sensing his distress, and wrapping him up in another hug. This one was not so much voracious as it was steadying, quicksand pulling Ash under, to a place away from the world where everything was calm.

A moment of peace. That was all he got. No more for Ash.

The universe was heartless like that.

An oddly merry shriek came from somewhere in their vicinity. “Oh, here we go; time to book it! The cops are here!”

Ash groaned, so blatantly incensed that it made Eiji cackle. He loosened his hold on Eiji begrudgingly and got to his feet, looking north. Sure enough, there was the wail of sirens and the flashing of red and blue lights not three blocks away.

Ash cast a glance at Eiji, who seemed amused more than anything else. “Surely, they’re not coming after you guys,” he said, appalled. “You helped! Don’t they have anywhere else to be?”

“Of course, they do. That’s why they’re coming after us last. Setting off flares and starting these many large fires in public spaces is illegal, after all. Air pollution laws are very serious here, even if we broke them for a good reason.”

“Oh, come on, that’s just bullshit!”

“Aslan,” Eiji placated, and Ash could see in his impish smile that he had something up his sleeve. “Do you want to stand here and argue with the cops, or”—he paused, clasping Ash’s hand with his own, unwavering, purposeful— “or do you want to go home with me, before we get caught?”

Ash snorted. He really thought he was done running for the night.

But the fireworks in Eiji’s eyes supercharged his adrenaline once more, and he squeezed their joined hands.

“Lead the way.”

Eiji grinned, all pink peppercorns and fruit punch, and let out an extended whistle. It travelled through the air like fairy-tale song, and Ash looked on in disbelief as the Vitae kids on this roof and the four roofs beyond it produced reinforced wooden planks from somewhere within the debris piles that sat in their corners. These planks were then toppled over, the space between the five buildings was bridged and the same whistle that Eiji had used was relayed forward to forge an airborne path through the settlement.

And just like that they began to run, hand in hand, skipping on nimble feet from one roof to the next on top of quivering planks.

They were not going nearly fast enough to totally outrun the police cars, and definitely not in the clear enough for the Vitae kids to be woo-hooing as much as they were, but Ash couldn’t help joining in. They all had Eiji’s particular form of abandon; they all had his firm disregard for consequences that stemmed not from misunderstanding their gravity, but from being indifferent to them. Because they believed, at their core, that they had done what was right, what was necessary for their community. And by virtue of this, their lilting sort of delight was infectious, and Ash found that it was only amplified in him by the way the wind whipped back his hair, and the absolute certainty with which Eiji brought him along, deft and confident, never going too fast, never pulling too hard, always checking to see that he was still laughing.

And if he wasn’t, then Eiji would twirl him spontaneously around a corner, or help him over the threshold of a roof like Ash was a prince stepping out of a carriage.

And fuck, there was this one part, where they had to hoist themselves up on top of a flat bulkhead because that’s where the plank was, and instead of just pulling himself up first and then bending down to help Ash, Eiji had simply hooked one arm around Ash’s thighs, lifted him up and sat him on the edge of the bulkhead in one casual, easy motion.

Ash had almost been able to hear Michael’s voice then.

Do you think he could pick you up with one hand?

And Ash could confirm now—skin tingling, heart tittering, sugar-spice giggling—that Eiji could.

He absolutely could pick Ash up with one hand, and Ash felt absolutely forsaken when he was let go of and compelled to run hand-in-hand again.

The other Vitae kids would chuckle at their shenanigans, joking and chastising Eiji, hollering “Keep your head in the game, Okumura!” and what not.

Ordinarily, Ash would be flustered to draw so much attention to their connection, but Eiji didn’t seem like he was even registering what was being said to him; it seemed like all he cared about was the smile on Ash’s face, and how to make it brighter.

It was the most devotion Ash had ever been on the receiving end of, and it stirred something within him.

A wanton sort of want, a reckless sort of pining, an exhilarated sort of craving.

And all it ached for was Eiji, Eiji, Eiji.

Up ahead of them there was a splintering sound, and Ash felt a brief spike of panic as he saw two cops sprint across the roof of the next building and toss aside the plank they were supposed to use. But Eiji simply deviated towards the fire escape of the building they were currently atop, this time using a shorter, sharper kind of whistle to communicate with the other Vitae kids. There were a few answering whistles, and then they began to descend the fire escape’s stairs.

“What did that mean?” Ash asked as they went, his words more air than sound.

“Scatter,” Eiji clarified, pulling him off the main road and into an alleyway the moment their feet touched the ground, even as all the other Vitae kids ran off in different directions. “It’ll be harder for them to catch us if we split up.”

They wove around building after building, Eiji asking Ash if they should go right or left on a whim. Miraculously, they were still laughing; somehow it was even more uncontrollable now that they had to be discreet enough to avoid the police officers searching on foot. Ash didn’t understand how Eiji had done it, but soon enough, they ended up in an area close to their building.

“I think we should go up to the roofs again,” Eiji said, slowing down as they came upon another building with an easy-to-access fire escape. “The police know I am Vitae, so they will probably be waiting outside my door.”

Ash shot him a puzzled look. “But how will we get inside your house from the roof? And without going through your front door, no less?”

Eiji opened his mouth to answer, but in that moment a police car screeched to a halt at one end of the alley they were in the middle of, and his smirk promptly fell off his face.

“Here!” he whispered, tugging Ash into the space under a stairwell.

It was a tight fit, and Eiji’s back was flat against the wall as he peered around Ash’s frame to see what the police car was doing. Ash turned too, and saw that the officer that was getting out and searching the alleys beyond for any absconding teenagers.

Eiji met Ash’s eyes, and his assessment of the situation was clear. They had to wait till this man went away. The cop had no reason to suspect that there was anyone in the alley they were hiding in yet, but he most certainly would pick up their trail if they made a break for the fire escape right now.

So, there they stayed, locked in a half-embrace, one of Eiji’s hands looped round Ash’s waist and one of Ash’s palms resting on the wall. They were both breathing hard, clothes clinging to their bodies, hair falling like sheer curtains before their eyes. Eiji wasn’t looking right at Ash; he had a better vantage point for spying on the officer, so he was keeping an eye on him. But Ash, oh, Ash couldn’t bring himself to look anywhere else but at Eiji.

Lit only by the alternating red and blue lights flashing from the top of the police car, a precious half-moon bathed in eclipse-and-impossibility colours. The cute curve of his cheeks juxtaposed against the defined lines of his collarbones, primrose petals against seashell ridges. The pronounced dip of his cupid’s bow, raspberry-marshmallow lips parted ever so slightly.

And to think, Ash had almost died tonight.

It stunned him, the severity of that fact.

Shit, Ash really had almost died tonight, hadn’t he?

Abseiling down the Mecha building, liberating the panthers, circumventing Arthur’s gunshots; he could’ve died at any point.

And to think he would’ve gone without flying with Eiji above the entire settlement, experiencing a freedom he never had before. To think he would’ve gone without discovering that Eiji really could pick him up with one hand.

To think he would’ve gone without ever finding out if Eiji really kissed like he kissed in Ash’s dreams.

God, why was he even holding back? Because of something as pedestrian as fear?

‘Don’t downplay it!’ Ash scolded himself. ‘You are holding back for very valid reasons. You will never forgive yourself if something happens to Eiji because of you.’

But…he could protect Eiji, couldn’t he?

Ash could, he would protect him; he wouldn’t let anything happen to Eiji. Even if things did not change, even if they did not get together, even if Eiji woke up tomorrow and decided he’d had enough of Ash after all.

So, what exactly did Ash think he was accomplishing, trying to hold Eiji at arm’s length even though he was failing so spectacularly at it?

‘You are lying to him,’ his reservations urged, grating, maddening, undesired. ‘You are lying to this beautiful honest boy, and you don’t deserve his selflessness. You don’t deserve his kisses, his skin on yours, all the sweetness he pours on you from some bottomless cup. You don’t deserve—’

I do want you. There.

That was Eiji’s voice in his head.

It won’t feel as bad with you there. Nothing feels very hopeless when you’re around.

A worn memory, worn from the sheer number of times Ash had replayed it. Addicting like candy, heady like wine.

You are more art than me. You are everything I can think of.

Eiji. Those were Eiji’s words drowning out his doubts.

Don’t think so much; just do what feels right. Commit.

‘You can’t not think,’ his inhibitions resisted, feeble, exhausted. ‘There’ll be no going back if you do this wrong.’

Just try. Turn off your big brain and see where your heart takes you.

Eiji, Eiji.

That was Eiji’s face in front of him now, his lovely doe eyes, his adorably mussed hair, his parted lips.

There was that feeling again, that wanton sort of want, that reckless sort of pining, that exhilarated sort of craving.

Eiji, Eiji, Eiji.

If Ash was light, then he was a black hole.

Because light could escape the clutches of everything, run circles around the universe without even trying, but if a black hole pulled, then the light would come.

The light would be drawn into its arms.

And God damn it, would it be so bad? Would it be so terrible if they just collapsed together?

If they survived the crushing gravity and the great gaping maw of the universe and made it to the other side?

If they fell into a new world entirely of their own? If they just...just...

Fuck it.

Ash dipped his head, leapt over the chasms of his own making, and kissed Eiji’s cheek.

Ephemeral, like butterfly wings brushing past a flower bud, yet so galvanic.

Ash felt that kiss deep in his bones, and he drew back nervously, suddenly sorry to be springing that intensity on Eiji while they were obviously in the middle of something.

But Eiji. Oh, Eiji. He didn’t even seem surprised.

If anything, it felt like there was finally enough oxygen in the air for Eiji to breathe easy. His eyes fell shut and he exhaled as if relieved, as if enchanted. Then he glanced up at Ash, smiling as if to say ‘There you are. Finally.’

They were separate for one more second, the second that it took for Eiji to make sure that the policeman’s back was turned. And then Eiji was going up on his tiptoes and kissing him.

Capturing Ash’s lips with his own like there was nowhere else he’d rather be.

And Ash found out then, that Eiji kissed nothing like he kissed in his dreams.

He kissed so much better.

In Ash’s dreams, Eiji’s kisses had always felt coy, like mischievous clouds drifting out of reach just before they could be grasped. They had tasted like caramel-apples and waffle cones.

In real life though, Eiji kissed ardent and unafraid, like liquid lightning and distilled warmth and a vow he would never break. He held Ash flush against his chest, tucking a strand of hair behind his ear just so he could stroke Ash’s cheek with his thumb.

In real life Eiji tasted like dew and twilight, and Ash’s thoughts whittled down to the essential.

There was nothing else but Eiji’s hair cascading over his fingers like silk, his eyelashes tickling Ash’s skin where their faces were pressed close together and his palm on the small of Ash’s back, safe, grounding.

 Kiss. Inhale. Touch.

Smile. Exhale. Kiss some more.

Live.

On the cusp of paradise, every caress an indulgence, every breath a gift.

Like Ash had always wanted.

They broke apart when they heard the revving of the police car’s engine. After what had seemed like a minor eternity, the police officer had left, entirely deaf to the pounding of their runway hearts.

“Aslan,” Eiji laughed the moment the car had receded into the distance. “We should go home.”

Ash wilted against him, face tucked into his neck, pressing him against the wall just a little as he did. “Mm,” he said most eloquently, too dizzy for words.

Eiji giggled, ruffling Ash’s hair with one hand while the other pinched just above his waist. “You’re so sweet. My light in the dark, Aslan. My apple-blossom honey, Aslan.”

Ash whined, torn between ‘You take that back’ and ‘Say it again’, trembling as he tried to keep his knees from giving out.

“Fuck you, Eiji.”

---

They emerged from under the stairwell eventually, jogging up the fire escape and back onto the rooftops still hand in hand.

Most of the Vitae kids had made themselves scarce by this point, and it was relatively peaceful as they hurried across five more planks. When they finally stood upon the roof of their own building, Eiji brought him over to the gigantic hole in it, the one that led all the way down to Eiji’s own apartment, the one that allowed them to stargaze out of Eiji’s bedroom. It was right next to a tarped mountain of what Ash presumed was old tools and debris, and he couldn’t think how they were going to get inside of Eiji’s apartment from here.

“What, you expect me to jump down that thing?” he scoffed.

“Yes and no,” Eiji said, disentangling their hands despite the pout on Ash’s face. He pulled the tarp off the large pile then, and showed Ash that it wasn’t a pile at all, but a fixed pulley system anchored to the top of the roof, with a small weight on one end and a wooden plank tied to the other end.

The plank was just wide enough to fit through the hole, just wide enough to fit one person.

Or two people, if they stood nose-to-nose.

“You’re so extra,” Ash remarked with a half-smile, watching as Eiji dropped the weight down through the hole. He then moved to adjust the plank over top of it when he heard the muffled thump of the weight hitting his bedroom floor. “Is this really necessary, or are you just trying to look cool?”

Eiji clasped his hand, one foot on the plank and the other on the roof, and Ash yelped unflatteringly as he was yanked onto the plank as well.

“Does it matter?” Eiji asked, kissing the tip of his nose.

Ash wanted to glare at him, but it was too nice here in his arms; too cosy, too right. It was only fitting that he be honest.

“Not really. Not if we’re gonna stay like this.”

Eiji hummed softly and did a last-minute check to make sure everything was secure. Then he murmured, “Hold on,” in Ash ears, and pushed the plank off the roof.

The whirring of the pulley was loud in Ash’s ears as they fell through every ceiling above Eiji’s own, and their momentum was a little too fast for his taste. But when he wrapped both arms tight around Eiji’s middle and concentrated on those rum-and-coffee eyes smouldering mere centimetres from his own, Ash found himself falling in an entirely different way, into a trance, into peach syrup, into that world that was entirely their own.

They were both breathless when they hit the bottom, flopping down onto Eiji’s bedroom floor side by side. Sweating, red-faced, their legs jelly from running, and their fingers still stubbornly entwined.

“I should call Charlie,” Eiji panted, fumbling for his phone. “He is high up enough to make the air pollution charges go away.” One of his fingernails lightly scratched Ash’s. “You should call your parents too. Let them know where you are.”

Hm. Yes, Ash knew he should do that. It was important.

But when he looked over at Eiji, kind fire to his bitter snowfall, he couldn’t help but wanting to melt, just to keep this…this dream realized…going for a little while longer.

“In a minute,” Ash breathed, snuggling up to Eiji’s side, one hand on his chest as he rested his forehead against Eiji’s own. “Just give me a minute.”

“Aslan,” Eiji chided, tugging gently on a lock of his hair.

Ash nuzzled his cheek, pleased when Eiji threw an arm around his waist, elated when he began to doodle heart shapes onto the sliver of skin that was exposed where Ash’s shirt rode up. “One minute,” Ash pleaded.

“Thirty seconds.”

“Forty-five.”

Eiji cupped his cheek with one hand. “Deal. Seal it with a kiss?”

Ash laughed, endlessly charmed as he leaned down to oblige. “That’s not fair,” he said against Eiji’s lips. “We’ll spend all the forty-five seconds like that.”

“Kiss me till I forget to keep count, then. Kiss me till I forget everything but you.”

Chapter Text

Entry #8          Summertime Snow

The colour of the end of an era.

The colour of white chocolate kisses, the colour of bittersweet sighs.

The colour of dissipating fog, fresh pages, the feathered fringe of sunrise.

The color of laughing river rapids, the colour of plucked heartstrings.

The colour of sweet abandon.

---

Bluestar flowers were for Aviation graduates.

Mostly for their colour, which matched the insignia of the department.

Pale and diffused like open sky whipped with shreds of cloud, shaped the way a twinkle would be, if it wasn’t just a trick of light traversing unimaginable distances.

Bluestar flowers were for Shorter.

Marigolds and thyme leaves on the other hand, were for Cain.

Marigolds because they stood for the inventive spirit of Mecha; thyme leaves because they were the same shade as the Combat department’s coveralls. Arranged like statuesque flames, with little green arrowheads peeking through to spare the viewer’s eyes from being blinded.

But snow-in-summers?

Those flowers, Sing had explained to Ash, were only bestowed upon the Vitae kids.

Like crystals of moonlight and ironic heralds of the approaching summer, they grew amongst sweeps of the frosty emerald foliage lining the sides of the roads in Wolfsbane, each flower vibrant like a teardrop at noon.

They bloomed persistently this time of year despite the increasing heat; where one flower wilted another rapidly took its place. Vulnerable upon first glance, yet in truth, the hardiest of the graduation flowers. Tiny things on their own, but indomitable in their great numbers.

Fitting, for the Vitae kids. Fitting, for Eiji.

Ash knelt by the edge of the road, surveying the milky swathe of flowers spread out before him.

Of all the lies he had ever told Eiji, the one that had gotten him here was the one he couldn’t bring himself to regret.

“’M dizzy. And my head hurts. It was so sunny during the endurance drills today,” he’d said.

Heading home from school, wrapped around Eiji, face pressed into the back of his neck. The scent of syrup-drenched flora steadily scrambling Ash’s brain. Eiji’s fingers ghosting over his wrist, all sparkler rain and satin feathers; his kisses caressing Ash’s knuckles.

And sure enough, his voice in Ash’s ears, tender as poetry, calling off their usual afternoon homework session in favour of marching Ash straight to his room so he could rest.

Eiji had put him in bed, brought their foreheads together to check his temperature, gotten out a blanket because he knew Ash liked to be cosy, but made sure it was the lightest one so Ash wouldn’t be stuffy if he did decide to use it. He’d set a bottle of cold water within easy reach, let down half the tarp on the window, readjusted the fan in the corner so that it would point toward the bed.

Ash had recognized it all as standard procedure for potential heat exhaustion, and his heart had swelled so much it’d nearly cracked.

“Feel better soon, honey,” Eiji had said, nose to his pulse, lips in his hair, just before seeing himself out.

Honey.

In his more foolish moments, Ash would feel sure that it was his blonde hair, that had prompted the nickname.

It had to be, didn’t it? For someone like Eiji, who was just a few odd paintings shy of being a connoisseur of colour?

But then Ash would hear Eiji whisper it when they kissed.

“Honey.” Soft and reverent when his breath puffed against Ash’s cheeks.

“Honey.” Indulgent and doting when his nose rubbed against Ash’s own.

“Honey.” Ardent and near helpless when his palms cupped Ash’s face.

And Ash would feel at the tips of every nerve, that no, it couldn’t possibly be something as trivial and fickle and mutable as his hair.

Ash promised himself, if he ever became brave enough to know the answer, that he’d ask Eiji about it.

Because Eiji said ‘Aslan’ like an endearment, but ‘honey’? He said that like it was irrefutable truth.

As if with every ‘honey’ he was building something grand, something beautiful, something permanent that would withstand the sands and storms of time, that would give Ash somewhere to hide when Eiji’s arms were not around him.

Which was precisely why Ash had jumped up the moment the front door of the apartment had closed behind Eiji, one hundred percent alert, counting down the minutes it would take for Eiji to get to his own apartment.

Because today, Ash’s mission was to pick a bunch of the very best snow-in-summers, and it would not do to have Eiji find out about it.

Because Eiji was graduating from the Academy in less than two days, having just broken the record for the fastest full mountain course run in Vitae history. And he deserved the intricate flower crown that Ash was going to make for him in celebration of this.

Such a present was usually prepared by family; Nadia and Cain’s Ma had begun the preparations for Shorter and Cain’s crowns as far back as last week. And though Shunichi had already decided to join them to make sure that Eiji had a crown as well, that wasn’t going to stop Ash from making one of his own.

One crown was twenty flowers too few for Eiji’s hair. It was fluffy, voluminous, and its colour ran ocean deep. The flowers would sink into it, never to come back to the surface. Not a terrible fate by any means, but it was meant to be a crown, damn it. People had to be able to see the flowers.

Which was exactly why there had to be two crowns, Ash told himself, as he picked the best blossoms. He chose only those that were half-open; the fully flowered ones would become droopy before graduation day even if he put them in water, Sing had warned.

Ash made a mental note to do something truly special for the kid; his information had ended up being invaluable.

In the end, he came away with thirty-six flowers, all gathered delicately between his palms. A lot of them were extras just in case, but Ash couldn’t help but contemplate putting all of them into the crown.

Double the flowers did mean double the scent in Eiji’s hair.

Oh, he could almost see it now.

Encircling Eiji in a back-hug, nuzzling behind his ear, dragging his nose through inky, soft locks, smelling fresh rain, young root-sprouts, dew-drenched berries, and so many, many dainty white flowers.

Snow-in-summer. Stars-in-space. Sparkles-in-silk.

Ephemeral, elixir-sugar, gorgeous.

Eiji was so gorgeous.

And wasn’t it amazing, that Ash was the one who got lazy evenings on the couch with him, head on his chest and waist warmed by his sure hands? Wasn’t it positively unbelievable that Ash was the one who got to kiss away the pain from rope burns on his palms and sun burns on his shoulders and hot-dye-pot burns from his fingertips?

Wasn’t it just an absolute dream, that Ash got to fall out of the sky one day, rigid and certain and cynical, into the life of someone like Eiji, so strange and vivid and unyielding, just like the planet he inhabited?

Oh yes, it was a dream, a sun-soaked, blissfully buzzing, psychedelic dream, and it was not lost on Ash, that each time he had to shake himself out of it and awaken to the reality of his situation, it became harder and harder to do so.

Case in point: it took him a full five minutes after walking through the door of his apartment and rummaging around for a bowl for the flowers to even notice Max.

Sprawled atop the kitchen island, face-down in his papers with ominous exhaustion hanging around him like mist.

Ash gulped, his bones turning to smoke. “What?” he asked, pointedly addressing the back of Max’s head.

The man grumbled, his joints cracking as he sat up straight. Ash saw that there were bags under his eyes. An image of Max from the night before came back to him. He’d still been reading when Ash had gone to bed.

Hell, now that Ash was thinking about it, Max had been reading even when he’d left for school this morning.

“I’m sorry, kiddo.” Max’s voice sounded like a rake carding through dry leaves as he met Ash’s narrowed eyes. “I think I may have pulled you into something bad. Like really bad. Like worst-case-scenario bad.”

Ash couldn’t help the mirthless laugh. He gingerly set down the flowers in his hands onto the kitchen island, then plonked himself into the seat opposite Max. “Well, if it makes you feel any better, it wasn’t you who pulled me into it.”

It wouldn’t. Ash knew it wouldn’t without even looking at the way Max’s face twisted.

And despite the mid-afternoon sunlight spilling onto their forms through the open window, the temperature in the room seemed to drop. They both knew who Ash was talking about, yet there was too much fraternity there to say his name aloud, to blame him decisively.

Because…well, they both knew it wasn’t as convenient as all that.

“I wish I could let it go,” Max confessed, shaking his head. “I wish I could just drop it, be the husband Jess deserves; be the father than you and Mikey deserve. But I can’t. Sometimes I consider it. And I’m ashamed to admit that I’ve considered it more often since we moved to Earth. Our friends are here, and we’ve been safer here than we’ve ever been, and I’ve thought, maybe…maybe we don’t need to be free of it. Maybe we can just be normal, and that will be enough for us to be happy. But then I see his eyes in yours when you laugh, and I think…no. No, I cannot leave it alone. Because he should’ve been here, the way the rest of us are. You should’ve gotten the chance to know him. But he’s not here, and we owe it to him to do the right thing.”

“Maybe you owe it to him,” Ash said quietly.

Max caught his eyes then, more than a little embarrassed. “No, of course, I’m not saying ‘we’ as in you and me; I’m saying ‘we’ as in—”

“I know what you’re saying Max.” Ash sighed. “What I’m saying is that while I didn’t know him, I do know you. And I know Jess and Mikey, and—and our, um, family, means a lot to me. So, you don’t need to apologize, okay? For pulling me into anything. Now, what’d you find out?”

Max rubbed his temple, then began leafing through the papers, as if searching for a way to begin. “Remember how I said that there was trouble at the power plant the night of the blackout?”

“You said that Dawson’s brother got away in all the chaos. You said that a spaceplane came for him.” Ash repeated the information dejectedly.

Win some, lose some, he placated himself. They’d managed to stop Arthur, but his co-conspirator had gotten off scot-free, and well, one couldn’t have everything, could they?

“Yes, but remember how I said that I didn’t recognize the markings on the spaceplane’s body?” Max said, eyes lighting up as he found the paper he was looking for.

Ash nodded, and Max placed the paper before him. The most prominent thing on it was a symbol: a set of fangs silhouetted against a half-moon, and Ash began to read what was written under it as Max continued to talk.

“It took a bit of digging around and calling in favours, but I finally got my hands on some records that show who uses those markings on their machines.”

“Lee Hua Lung?” Ash stared down gravely at the words on the paper, only looking up when they begin to swim before him. “As in—”

“Second brother of the Lee clan, yeah.”

Ash frowned, and Max shrugged. “Told you it was bad,” he said, as if it would tamp down any of the dread Ash was feeling.

God fucking damnit, it just had to be them, didn’t it?

As if Golzine wasn’t enough, now they had to contend with the Lees too?

The same Lees whose six brothers and their mammoth companies had monopolized the commercial space flight industry. The same Lees who controlled Atlantis and Camelot. The same Lees who had an espionage network so robust that Ash almost expected one of their spies to pop out from behind the sofa and accost them right then.

It was a state of affairs so dismal, Ash’s first instinct was to reject it.

“I thought all Lee machinery was branded with their family’s six-headed cobra. Where’d this new symbol suddenly come from?”

“That’s the thing; it’s not new at all,” Max elaborated, spreading out some more documents in front of Ash. “It was trademarked about fifteen years ago, right around the time that story broke about old man Lee taking on an underage mistress and getting her pregnant. From what I can tell, he set aside a fleet of discreet, state-of-the-art spacecraft under a new rental company—a company with this symbol—and named the girl and her son as next in line to inherit it after his death. I think he knew his family would destroy those two if they claimed any public association with the Lee name or tried to access any of the generational wealth.”

Ash scoffed. “Fat lot of good that did. Poor woman got murdered by the brothers the moment the geezer kicked the bucket.”

“But that wasn’t all they did. My source tells me that they also took full custody of her son. And since he was only five at the time—”

“They also took ownership of the company that’s technically supposed to be his,” Ash reasoned. “And he’s still a minor, so I doubt they’ve given it back, if they were even planning to.”

“Bingo,” Max said, waving around his pen. “Now the general consensus is that Hua Lung loans out those planes to whoever can afford them, no questions asked.”

“But if Golzine was the renter, then I imagine questions were asked.” Ash slapped a palm on his forehead. “So, what, now we gotta go forward on the assumption that we’re fighting both the Lees and Golzine?”

“Don’t forget Arthur,” Max added, and Ash’s skin prickled even further. “Charlie swung by earlier today, and apparently, he’s dropped out of the Academy. The panthers messed him up, but they weren’t able to kill him. He’ll be back eventually, and he’s going to come for you, regardless of who’s paying him and for what.”

Ash clenched his jaw, trying to refrain from nibbling on the inside of his cheek. Not out of fear or anxiety, but sheer annoyance. He knew better than to underestimate the audacity of a man with a bruised ego and a god complex, and the realization that one of these days Arthur would crawl out of the shadows, and he really would have to take care of him for good weighed on Ash like cement in his lungs.

But what other option was there?

If the night of the blackout had taught Ash anything, it was that Arthur could not be left to his own devices in Wolfsbane, at least not as long as Golzine lived.

“Don’t bother with Arthur; I can deal with him,” he said. “What I’m more interested in is the whole BANANA FISH thing. Where are you with figuring out what that is?”

Max let out a sound that Ash would’ve only expected from a dying donkey and pushed a gigantic binder towards Ash.

“Found all of that in loose sheets at the power plant after Dawson and the rest of Golzine’s people had cleared out,” Max detailed as Ash flipped it open. “It’s most of the research on Professor Dawson’s FISH tech.”

“And whatever BANANA is,” Ash said under his breath, taking in the pages upon pages of chemical formulas, NMR readings and molecular structures.

Organic chemistry.

Of all things, of course it had to be O-Chem, the one thing that Ash was rusty at, the one thing that threw a wrench into the well-oiled machine that was his brain.

“Ugh,” he said, wrinkling his nose.

“I know,” Max complained. “We’re doomed.”

Yes, Ash supposed they were, at least when it came to trying to decipher all the BANANA FISH research in one sitting.

But outside of that…

No, Ash would not, he could not accept damnation. Not now, not when…

His gaze fell on the corner of the binder then. A petal from one of the snow-in-summer flowers was caught under it. Ash yanked the flower away reflexively, but when he held it up to inspect it, he found that the binder’s corner had ripped into the petal.

All because he’d moved too fast, used too much force.

Ash set it down, forlorn. He didn’t want to throw it away; it was only a tiny rip, and the flower was still beautiful.

But it couldn’t go in the flower crown now. No, all he’d be able to do would be to press it into one of his books. Keep it as memory, nothing more.

What was wrong with him? He’d been so careful with the flowers before, carrying them as gently as he was able. Why had he done this now? Why had he been so harsh with something so precious?

“I’ll help you make some sense of this,” Ash said to Max, getting to his feet. “But first, I need a bowl.”

Max raised his eyebrows.

“A bowl? What d’you need a bowl for?”

“For the flowers. They need to go in water if they’re going to stay fresh for the graduation ceremony. And they just—they need to not be here, just like this on the island. Not when we’re doing this.”

“Yeah, I agree; they’ll just get in the way.”

No, it wasn’t about them getting in the way. It was about them getting hurt. It was about them getting ruined.

---

The graduation ceremony took place after Char Hour had passed. Something about the brightness of the sun being a symbol for the brightness of the futures of all the young graduates.

Heads were bowed and flower crowns were bestowed. Eiji’s eyes had swum and glittered like stained-glass when Ash had shyly placed his own crown on top of the one Shunichi had made. It had black-pearl rose petals interspersed with the snow-in-summers, taken from the flower that Eiji had put in his hair all those months ago, the flower that Ash had preserved so painstakingly.

“Aslan, you didn’t have to.”

“Fuck off. I wanted to.”

“You’re sweet.”

“You’re pretty,” he’d said, playfully tugging on Eiji’s earlobe.

Eiji’s eyes had flitted this way and that for a second, colour spreading across his cheeks like spilled watercolour, and before Ash had known it, he’d lifted himself up on his tiptoes and kissed him on the nose in front of everyone.

“Thank you, honey,” he’d giggled, darting out of Ash’s reach with a wink.

And Ash had been left to just stand there, dizzier than if someone had hit him upside the head, his heart pitter-pattering, his breaths stuttering, his arms aching, for Eiji, Eiji, Eiji.

The nerve. The fucking nerve of this boy.

After all the graduates had taken their assigned seats, there had been speeches. The professors of every department had gone on and on about how resilient everyone had been, what with the hurricane and the blackout and Dawson’s untimely death. They’d said many things about how proud they were that their school’s graduates were going to go on to do great work for the space colonies, how they expected them to show the Star People that the people of Earth were well worth investing in, and how they were finally going to escape this place and live the way they’d always deserved to live.

The eyerolls of the Vitae professors at these comments hadn’t escaped Ash’s notice, and he’d cast his eyes towards Eiji, only to find him looking upon the speaking professors with thinly veiled pity, like they were reviling plums without ever having tried one.

Ash had to purse his lips to stifle a laugh. How like Eiji to not be angry, but sympathetic instead, towards those who could not see the value of his home.

The ceremony concluded with all the graduates plucking a flower from their crowns and tossing it to the wind. There was whoo-hooing and hugging and the scraping of chairs as everyone leapt to their feet and ran around trying to find their families. And after the throng of guests trickled out of the premises, the Academy began to close for summer vacation.

The décor and furnishings for the event were put away, classrooms were locked, roof and runway access for every structure was restricted. All buildings were shuttered, and the massive front gates were locked with a resolute clang.

Bold of admin to think that any of that was going to stop Shorter Wong, of course.

“What the hell are you doing?” Ash deadpanned as Shorter brought him to the gates later that day, when the sun was low on the horizon.

Shorter leapt up to grab the bars of the gate and began to hoist himself up, using the brackets in its criss-crossing façade as footholds. “What, d’you need me to draw you a diagram?”

Ash scowled. “Okay. Rephrase: why the hell are you doing it?”

“It’s our last day at the Academy,” Shorter said. He fixed his flower crown where it sat askew on top of his mohawk, then threw one leg over the top of the gate. “As if we’d spend it just being lectured for three hours in the grounds. Now are you coming or not?”

Ash groaned, loud and deliberate, but relented eventually, clambering over the gate just as Shorter had.

“Where’re we even going?” Ash asked when they’d both dropped down on the other side. “Everything’s closed.”

“Not everything,” Shorter grinned, and Ash followed his gaze off into the distance as they walked.

And where were they heading, but towards the hell-mountain.

The foot of it was so broad that Ash couldn’t see around the edges of it, and as they approached, he heard faint snatches of music on the wind, scratched with static like it was coming through a radio and mixed in with laughter.

Oh, great. Of all the places to have an after-party, his friends had chosen the top of an unscalable monstrosity.

Sure, Ash had run the prescribed Mecha drills on the hurdles by the bottom on Endurance Day before, but he had no idea how to get to the peak.

“Fuck you,” he growled, punching Shorter’s shoulder. “I didn’t come here for a workout.”

Shorter waved him away with a roguish smirk, going for one of the bars sticking out of the mountain-face. “Trust me, you won’t have to.”

As if on cue, a dark head popped out over the edge of the summit.

“Aslan, there you are! Look what I made!”

Oh. Ash knew that voice. That raspberry-gin-and-tonic voice that was Eiji’s alone.

So sweet. So light. So bursting-at-the-seams when he was excited like this.

Flower crowns balanced on his head like a dual halo. Prim button-up half open and shrugged tastefully off his shoulder, gleaming bronze in the dying light. Midnight-firecracker gaze intent on Ash.

And the reigns of a pulley system much like the one installed on the roof of their building clasped in one fist.

It was a more sophisticated setup, one which used the highest steel bar set into the side of the mountain as an axle and had two wooden platforms ample enough to stand on top of on either end of the rope.

Ash smiled up at him. Leave it to Eiji to think of everything. “You’re so fucking cool, babe.”

“’Course he is,” Alex chimed in, hanging over the edge of the summit too now. “How d’you think the rest of us got up here?”

Bones and Kong came up behind Alex to wave to him too, and Ash glared half-heartedly at them all as Eiji lowered one of the platforms down to him. “I can’t believe you guys are gonna make him ferry you up and down this stupid mountain on his graduation day.”

The trio at the top shrunk away, genuinely apologetic, but Eiji only giggled as he positioned himself on the other platform, one of his legs still planted firmly on the mountain top. “It’s okay, honey, I don’t mind.”

Ash softened then, and stepped onto the platform before him too, holding onto the rope tightly. “Ready when you are!”

The trademark whirring of rope sliding over metal filled Ash’s ears as he rose off the ground and Eiji descended down the mountain side. They passed each other in the middle, and Ash stretched out his arm so he could brush his fingers against Eiji’s own as the latter fell.

It felt nice, to reach for Eiji, and to have him reach back. Just because.

Before, Ash had looked for excuses for them to be close or had been bewildered by his own luck when the closeness was granted by Eiji.

But now, well, there was no reason to interrogate the whys and hows now.

They were going to be close because they liked to be close. That was the end of that.

And how freeing it all was, for Ash.

He wondered if it was freeing for Eiji too, if Eiji felt the same head-full-of-dandelion-fluff-chest-full-of-ice-cream-soda-can’t-stop-smiling type of happy when they were together as well, because God knew Ash was getting hooked on that feeling.

He promised himself he’d ask Eiji about it, the day he found the courage to hear the answer.

For better or worse, though, that day was not today.

No today, there was only the synthetic crooning of the radio, mismatched cups of Shorter’s famous ‘adulterated’ orange juice, two large tubs of cut up mangoes and watermelons courtesy of Nadia, and the entirety of the Wolfsbane settlement spread out before Ash’s eyes under a peach-apricot sunset.

Pulling himself over summit’s edge the moment the pulley brought him within arm’s length of it, Ash stared out at the view, all three hundred and sixty degrees of it.

The buildings, clumped in craggy shapes and leaning towards each other like trees in a forest. Roads winding between them, like rivulets of water navigating through a rockface. The Woodlands, like green velvet dappled with orange and maroon ringing the horizon. The power plant, the water plant, and the airport, nothing more than cardboard cut-outs, small and meaningless at this distance. And beyond, the ocean blurring into the sky, the sun reflected in it as if a candle-flame flickered just under its surface.

Truly beautiful, a sight that only Shorter and Eiji had ever seen. But Ash got to share in it today, got to marvel at it with Sing and Cain as they munched on their fruit, got to gasp, and whistle in general with all the others who’d never been up here either.

Ash settled into the gathering as Bones brought him a cup of juice, folding his jeans up to the knees so he could dip his feet into the crater-pool in the middle of the summit. The water was just the right amount of warm from being under the blazing sun all day to offer some counter to the wind blowing his hair back, and Ash swished his legs back and forth. The aftertaste of the juice made his face crumple a bit; it wasn’t as sweet as he’d been expecting, but all his friends drank it anyway, dancing and splashing about in tune with the music, stilted though it was on a hijacked space-colony frequency.  

Even Ash found himself swaying along as he looked out at the settlement, half-smile on his face as he idly searched for his apartment building amongst the countless others.

“Do you like what you see?”

The question came from over his shoulder, butterscotch-esque and pressed against the shell of his ears, and Ash bit his lip as a familiar arm snaked around his shoulder.

Only Eiji. Only Eiji was allowed to do things like this, to come up behind him and touch him in this way.

Because Eiji was safe, and his hands never hurt.

Ash took him in, just a little bit giddy. Eiji’s bangs clung to his forehead, sweaty from climbing up the mountain again, and his face was incandescent in such diluted sunlight. He was smiling that secret sort of smile, like a glimmer upon a moonlit lake, and the words slipped out before Ash could stop them.

“Yes. I do.”

Eiji blushed, rosé in headlights, smacking Ash’s chest lightly as he sat down by his side. He took off his shoes so he could put his feet in the water as well, and Ash’s brain noted for absolutely no reason at all, that he was wearing his short-shorts.

Their ankles knocked together under the water just as their thighs touched on land and Ash shivered pleasantly as Eiji wilted against him, tuckered out from going up and down the hell-mountain. They watched the sun follow its due course towards the ocean, inching slowly as if on timid feet.

“I can’t believe you got to see this view basically every day,” Ash said, petting Eiji’s head where it rested against his shoulder.

“I know,” Eiji murmured, wistful. “I don’t appreciate it sometimes. I’ve been up here so many times; everything about it has become muscle memory. It scares me a little, that I have become so used to it. When I was younger, I wanted nothing more than to be able to see it.”

“When did you first start climbing the hell-mountain?”

“Freshman year. They started us off with the base drills, and then we worked our way up. It’s funny; it doesn’t seem like much now, but back then the mountain looked so tall to me that I was convinced I would be able to see the whole world from the top.”

Ash smiled. He could almost see it: adorable fourteen-year-old Eiji, his wide eyes growing even wider, planetary systems expanding into galaxies as they traced the steep incline of the mountain all the way to the elusive top that seemed to touch the sun.  “And could you? See the world?”

Eiji’s eyes shimmered with something fragile, like spun sugar. “I could see enough. I could see what was important to me.”

Ash examined the horizon. It did not even curve here, like it had done when he’d looked out of the window during re-entry and first seen Earth.

It was that small, he realized. In the grand scheme of things, Wolfsbane was just that small.

And yet, it was all Eiji had ever known; it was home. Something that meant more than any machine would ever be able to quantify.

“Do you…do you ever wish you could see more?” Ash asked, hesitant.

Eiji shook his head, like even the notion was not worth entertaining. “I am Vitae,” he reminded. “I must do my best with what is given. I cannot ask for more.”

A thorn lodged itself in Ash’s heart. He talked to himself like this all the time, and with what he felt was good reason, but Eiji? Eiji had no business thinking such things.

“You can. You should,” he insisted, his voice half-muffled by Eiji’s hair and flower petals. Which was just as well. He didn’t want to be heard by anyone but Eiji. “I wish more for you in all ways, in every way. You deserve it. More, better, only the best.”

Eiji peeked up at him, a little incredulous, a little sad. “So do you, honey. So do you.”

Ash sucked in a sharp breath and broke eye-contact immediately. He didn’t want Eiji to see even a shadow of what he was thinking on his face, because he was having a foolish moment.

That foolish voice in his head was trying to persuade him that Eiji didn’t really mean that, that he was saying it just to return the compliment, or to be romantic or something, but Eiji wouldn’t lie to him—he couldn’t lie to him—which meant that he did mean it, which meant that he was obviously very mistaken, which was all Ash’s fault of course, because he was always lying to Eiji, God, how hurt would Eiji be when he’d find out that Ash was actually—

“Eiji, babe, I—”

Cloudberry lips pressed against Ash’s own for one eternal moment, and his mind went blank, the foolish voice and his own foolish words evaporating at once.

When his eyes opened again, Eiji was pulling away from his face, mischief curling the corner of his mouth. “Shh. You do, okay, Aslan? Trust me on this.”

Oh, fantastic. What the fuck was Ash supposed to say to that?

He buried his face in Eiji’s shoulder. “I get the feeling we’re both going to lose this argument.”

“Doesn’t sound too bad to me,” Eiji said, kissing the crown of his head.

Ash wrapped his arms around Eiji’s waist in response. “Me neither.”

They stayed like that until the song on the radio changed again. Something with a violin came on, something that felt like a rollercoaster that only went up, something that felt like the looming threat of shifting seasons.

It was unnerving enough that Ash felt compelled to voice the question that had been on his mind for the past few weeks, even as Eiji’s fingers drummed on his hip in time to the beat.

“Do you know what you’ll do? Now that you’ve graduated?”

The drumming on Ash’s hip faltered, then gave way to circles. “I’ll always participate in emergency response for the settlement if it’s needed,” Eiji said, his voice measured. “But outside of that, I was given a choice. I could help with crop cultivation in The Woodlands, or I could be part of the Scouts.”

Ash’s breath hitched.

The Scouts.

As in the people who ventured far and away from the settlement to gauge the hospitability of the surrounding areas.

As in the people who disappeared for months on end into the perilous maw of the mountains at the edge of Wolfsbane just to make sure that the community had somewhere to go in case the worst happened, and the current location had to be abandoned.

As in the people who rarely ever returned from the unforgiving wilderness without losing at least one person.

Something coarse and ugly gnawed at Ash’s heart. Of course, Eiji would be chosen to be part of The Scouts. Such an assignment was reserved for the crème de la crème of Vitae, and Eiji had set the Endurance Course record for God’s sake. It was a great honour to even be considered at all and Eiji would be well respected within the community if he accepted the position.

And yet, Ash couldn’t bear the thought of him taking it.

He couldn’t bear the thought of Eiji in constant mortal danger. He couldn’t bear the thought of not waking up to Eiji’s face every morning.

Everything was good, like this. It was incredible, like this. Ash couldn’t bear the thought of it not being this way anymore.

“And—and have you…chosen yet?” he asked, trying to keep the apprehension out of his voice.

“I have.”

Ash closed his eyes and nodded, resigned now. He shifted closer to Eiji, waiting for this bubble to burst, waiting for his insides to turn into metal and sand.

“I told them I didn’t want either job.”

And just like that, Ash’s being exploded into caramel and butterflies instead.

He unstuck from Eiji and searched his eyes. “You don’t?”

“No. I, um, I’ve been thinking a lot about what you said about my paintings, and a few days ago, I showed one of them to Ibe-san.”

Eiji smiled then, tart like a guava-starfruit sorbet, and Ash got the feeling he was about to be made fun of. “It was the one I did of you; ‘Stupid Engineer’, do you remember it?”

He blew out a laugh. “You know I do. What did Shunichi think of it?”

“He…really liked it,” Eiji said, diffident as he straightened one of his flower crowns absently. “He said that I have a lot of potential and that he’d train me, as a proper artist, if I wanted it. And—and I’ve realized…I do want that. So that’s what I’m gonna do now. Of course, it doesn’t pay as much as I need, which is why I applied for an Endurance Course instructor position the moment one opened up at the Academy. That’s why I worked so hard to break the full-mountain course record; they only let the record-breakers teach. And well, they’ve said the job is mine, for as long as I want it.”

Ash gaped at him, trying to disentangle the relief and disbelief and residual grief within him as he attempted to bring words to his lips. And Eiji had the audacity to boop his nose, and tuck his hair behind his ears and say, “Do you like your surprise, honey?”

Did he like it? Did he like it?

Ash crashed into Eiji, hugging him hard enough to rock them both where they sat. “So…so we can still go to school together? In the morning?” he asked in a small voice.

Then instantly regretted it.

Honestly, of all the things to say. He could’ve said ‘Congratulations’ or ‘I’m happy for you’ or ‘You’re going to do so great’.

But no. Ash had only managed something as selfish as that.

But Eiji, wonderful Eiji, didn’t hold it against him.

“Of course we can, Aslan,” Eiji said, his laughter bubbling out of him like champagne. “You’ll have to find a new homework buddy for the afternoons, but apart from that, nothing changes.”

And despite the electricity whizzing under Ash’s skin, he couldn’t help but break the embrace. “Of course, things will change,” he said sulkily. “You’ll be way busier than before. You’ll be too tired to stargaze at night. We won’t get to properly hang out till the weekend.”

“True,” Eiji conceded with a sigh. “But all that will only start in the fall.”

He sat up, stuck out his chest, then histrionically leaned forward so he could put a finger under Ash’s chin and tip his face towards his own. “The summer, however, is all ours, honey.”

Ash couldn’t help but roll his eyes, couldn’t help but play along and inch closer. And when Eiji seemed totally convinced that he was going to kiss him, Ash couldn’t help but push at his shoulder and send him tumbling into the crater-pool with a yelp and a resounding splash. 

“Too cringey,” he teased.

He only got to be pleased with himself for a few seconds. Because Eiji’s garnet-flinted eyes were already peeping up above the water, and one strong palm was grasping Ash’s shin, and amid their friends’ uproarious laughter, he was yanked into the pool too.

“Too cocky,” Eiji retorted as Ash shrieked and flailed haphazardly towards him, his clothes too heavy on his body, especially his jeans. He dug his nails into Eiji’s back and clung to him the moment he was within reach, only for their friends to laugh even harder.

“Aw, come on, Okumura, you know better than to dunk a cat in water,” Shorter quipped, wobbling on his feet as he came to join them in the pool.

“Shut the fuck up all of you; I’m not above scratching your eyes out,” Ash threatened, hoping the sky was altogether too dark now for anybody to see how tightly his legs were wrapped around Eiji’s waist. Then he felt Eiji’s cackles rumbling in his chest, and promptly punched him as well.

“You shut up too!” he said indignantly. “You know I can’t swim.”

“Aslan,” Eiji began, and God, Ash hated, hated, how soothing his voice was. Damn Eiji and his stupid peppermint-chamomile voice. “This water’s got enough salt in it to keep your face floating above the surface even if you just stay in place. You couldn’t drown in it if you wanted to.”

Ash eyed the rippling liquid around him suspiciously, then looked to the others, who all nodded their assurance. “You promise?”

“I wouldn’t have pulled you in otherwise.”

Ash deflated at the sound of that. The initial surprise was wearing off now, and he could feel the delicious warmth of the water pressing the goosebumps on his forearms back into his skin. Sure, his lips were salty, and his eyes smarted a little, but nevertheless he could see the appeal.

It was quite lovely in the pool. He could see now why people dived into it after completing their course run.

Not that this motivated him to extricate himself from Eiji’s hold at all. No, if anything it made Ash throw his arms more decisively around Eiji. Yes, the pool was nice and warm, but Eiji was warmer, and infinitely more perfect.

“Alright,” he mumbled into Eiji’s neck. “Still though, fuck you.”

Eiji snorted. “Okay, honey.”

“I hope you realize that I’m going to stay like this as long as I damn well please, now.”

“I realize that, honey.”

“And don’t you even think of letting go.”

“Not until you want me to, honey.”

Ash huffed, then settled down at last. As if he would ever want that.

---

“Okay, quick: xiao long bao or nai wong bao?”

Ash looked up at Nadia from where he was sitting atop Shorter’s gigantic suitcase, trying to get the infernal thing to zip closed. He frowned at the two airtight containers she held out to him.

“Oh sure, please, bring out even more things to stuff into this already over-stuffed bag. It’s not like they’ll be weighing this at check-in—”

“Don’t give me lip; you’re the one who said that the food on the flight would be ass,” Nadia scolded, one hand on her hip. “Now pick, xiao long bao or nai wong bao?”

Ash grumbled, exasperated, then dutifully considered her question. How could he not, when her usual diamond sharp gaze was blunted by multiple sleepless nights? How could he not, when she’d spent the last two weeks in a whirlwind of packing and documentation?

How could he not, when she had one brother leaving their planet never to return, and another bawling in his arms right outside?

“I’ll pack both,” Ash said at length, getting off the suitcase and taking the containers from her hands. “He’s gonna miss you so much he’ll finish one of these while waiting for boarding.”

Nadia dismissed him with a grateful smile, then retreated into the Chang Dai’s kitchen while Ash crouched on the floor and readjusted the clothes in the suitcase, in an effort to cram in the containers.

“Hey, he needs to take out this jacket,” he called after Nadia, pulling one of Shorter’s bomber jackets out of the suitcase.

She came back out at the sound of that, a glass of lemonade balanced in each hand as she peered over his shoulder to see what the issue was. “Does he have to?” she asked, her face falling. “That one’s his favourite. There’s no other way to fit the baos in there?”

“Well no, but it’s not just about the baos,” Ash explained ruefully, turning the jacket over to show Nadia the Wolfsbane Academy Aviation Department insignia sewn onto the back. “He can’t bring anything that’s clearly an Earth thing. Once you go up there, they want you to be theirs. No other affiliations.”

Nadia shook her head, and her shoulders slumped. “Fine. Leave it out.”

She set down the lemonades on a nearby table as Ash packed the containers in, then bent down to help him close the suitcase.

“Do you think the Atlantis people will let him keep his call sign?” she inquired as they pushed down the top half of the suitcase together.

“They’ll have to,” Ash snickered, reaching for the zip. “He’s Shorter. I can’t imagine anyone calling him anything else.”

Nadia laughed quietly. “Neither can I. He has a government name, but the neighbourhood doesn’t even remember it anymore. He’s been ‘Shorter’ since he was seven years old.”

Ash raised a brow at that. “What d’you mean? It’s not just his call sign?”

“No,” Nadia’s eyes grew glassy now, as they both stood the closed suitcase up between them. She handed Ash a glass of lemonade—a thank you for helping out—then sipped pensively from her own glass.

“It was something Eiji’s dad used to call him,” she said after a moment. “He was always so hopped up on pain meds for his cancer that he could never remember which of us was which when we went over to play.”

Ash glanced at her dubiously. “Can’t imagine where that confusion came from.”

“This was before the mohawk and the piercings and the sunglasses. And I’ve always worn my hair this short.”

Huh. Ash wondered what Shorter was like, without all those things. He wondered where all that extravagance went, before he was old enough for those things.

“Anyway, Okumura-san was never good with our names,” Nadia went on, “but he always remembered that we were different heights. Since I was older, I was the ‘Taller’ Wong, and—”

“—he was ‘Shorter’ Wong,” Ash finished, his heart clenching in his chest. A wispy sort of sorrow pricked him, because Shorter called him ‘brother’ and yet Ash would never be able to share in this nostalgia.

“It made Eiji laugh, the first time he called him that. So, it just…stuck. Even after he outgrew me. And when he joined Aviation and it came time to give him a call sign, he kept the name. It was like you said. No one could imagine calling him anything else.”

Ash gazed out of the front window, a small smile on his face as he drank his lemonade. Shunichi’s car was parked outside, and Cain’s Ma was already sitting in the front seat. Max and Charlie were hefting luggage into the trunk, while Shunichi stood off to the side, presumably still arguing with the airport customer service about where to find parking. Everybody else was too busy saying their goodbyes to Cain and Shorter.

It had astonished Ash, how quickly the job offers had flooded in for the two of them. A part of him had felt dense for thinking that way; they were both highly accomplished in their respective concentrations after all, and their concentrations were among those that space colony employers kept a close eye on.

But still. It had only been a month since graduation. How could they be leaving already?

They’d always talked about it; this vague, nebulous, ‘when I’m gone’, ‘when I’m up there’ kind of thing. But their jokes had always been too loud then, for Ash to take seriously. Their company had been too tangible, for the suggestion to be real.

And yet now here it was, as real as the pinched feeling in Ash’s gut, spread out before him in much too fine detail.

Cain and Alex talking with their hands stuck stubbornly in their pockets, trying to appear nonchalant and stoic and failing miserably. Bones and Kong in the corner, drained after saying their farewells, struggling to maintain what little composure they still had while Jess attempted to console them. And Sing most of all, looking blotchy and smaller than ever, the corner of Shorter’s jacket balled in his fist as Eiji held him while he cried.

It was strange. Eiji was crying too, his nose red and his tears shining on his cheeks in the early morning sunlight, but there were no hysterics from him. His smile was bright like crushed pearls when he spoke to Shorter, and from that strawberry-bubble-gum lilt to his voice, Ash could tell that he was using his goodbye time to hype Shorter up for the life he had always wanted.

He was going to fly luxury recreational space planes to and from Atlantis. He was going to give joy rides, tell tourists quirky anecdotes about Earth, see all the bizarre and beautiful illusions light and darkness and clouds of gas could create.

And Ash knew Eiji was proud of him, even though that meant that they’d never see each other again.

“They’re all going to leave me, one by one,” Eiji had said to him, so serene and impossible. “I’ve known it since my first day of high school, and I have felt my sadness already. I cannot feel it anymore. I will miss them, yes, but there is nothing but happiness in my heart for them now.”

Where Eiji found the strength for something like that, Ash didn’t know. He himself was just as emotionally blindsided as everyone else.

“I wish I had more time with them,” he said morosely, looking to Nadia. “I wish I had been here, with all of you sooner.”

And Nadia smiled like fire under the earth, then messed his hair into a bird’s nest just to snap him out of it. “You’re family either way, Ash.”

“But I—”

“What’d I tell you before? Don’t give me lip,” she cut in, the same good-natured barb to her tone that Ash had always associated with Jess.

There was a nuance of course, Jess was more falcon and less swan like Nadia, but both had their merits, both had their very specific way of cutting through Ash’s bullshit.

“Time matters very little on Earth, Ash. People here die too fast and too suddenly for that. All that matters is what you do with your time. And what you’ve done is far more than anyone has the right to ask you for.”

 Nadia grabbed the handle of the suitcase between them then and gestured towards the door. “Come on now. You need to wrap up your goodbyes in the next ten minutes, or we’re going to be late.”

She went straight for the car the second they stepped out; it was clear her and Cain’s Ma planned on saying their piece at the airport itself. Eiji noticed Ash standing awkwardly by the entrance of the restaurant, then gently coaxed Sing away from Shorter as Alex took his leave from the gathering as well. He offered up an encouraging glance and a smile as Ash walked over to Shorter and Cain, and once Ash had been able to tear his eyes away from him, he steeled himself for the conversation he was about to have.

“So. Explosives technician for Elysium’s infamous R&D wing, huh?” he smirked, regarding Cain.

“Perfect place for a double agent of the resistance, don’t you think?” Shorter beamed, clapping Cain on the back as the latter held up his hands in a ‘What can I say? It’s what I do’ kind of gesture.

Something oppressive settled on Ash’s shoulders, like lava hardening to rock. “You’re sure about that, then? Both of you?”

“Yeah,” Cain replied, resolute. He cast a glance towards the car, towards the back of his Ma’s head as she chatted with Nadia. “We have people here, and we’re going to have them up there soon too. Earth deserves to not exist as a resource mine for the colonies, and the colonies deserve to live without feeling perpetually crushed under the great big boot of the central alliance.”

“He’s right,” Shorter agreed. “The only reason we leave our home is because it keeps fucking us over for no damn reason and with no damn warning. It’d be a real bummer if up there was a minefield too. We’re not gonna put up with it any longer than we have to.”

Ash couldn’t help but laugh at that. Understatement of the century, but he supposed understatements were necessary. Shorter and Cain had always held themselves like they could chew fear up in a single bite and snuff it out, but Ash could see it, in the grim set of their jaws. They were afraid, and rightfully so. And if they needed understatements and grandstanding to cope with it all, then who was Ash to deny them?

“Take care,” he said, nodding to Cain and doing his elaborate handshake with Shorter. “Watch your back. Pace yourself, with the sightseeing. There’s only so much of it out there and it’s gonna get old real quick. So, take it slow. And kick some elitist ass too, while you’re at it.”

“Right back at you,” Cain grinned. He looked around him for a moment, as if checking to see that the coast was clear. Then he brought out a box from the duffel bag hanging off his shoulder. It looked innocent enough—recycled cardboard from what Ash could tell—but he was wary, nonetheless.

“Smith and Wesson .357 Magnum. 3.5-inch barrel, bullets included,” he said, handing the box to Ash. “It’s my classiest piece. Doesn’t agree with me, though. So, I thought you’d like to have it, in case Arthur comes back.”

Ash’s gaze darted instinctively to Eiji, suddenly very aware that he was only a few feet away, tousling Sing’s hair and joking around to lift his mood as if nothing was wrong. As if the boy he kissed and called ‘honey’ so devotedly wasn’t standing here with a brutish weapon in his hands with the full intention of bringing it back to his house and hiding it under the bed they cuddled in.

Cain followed his eyes, and hastily tacked on, “Safely hidden under a pile of spacecraft ammunitions repair textbooks of course, in case someone decides to ask questions.”

Ash exhaled, the panic subsiding a bit. “Thanks,” he croaked.

“You gonna be okay?” Shorter asked, his voice trammelled wrath tempered with concern. “I talked to Max; it’s not looking too good, is it? On the whole…he-who-shall-not-be-named front?”

“I can handle it.”

It was a reflex at this point, wasn’t it? Of course, Ash had to handle it. He’d die if he didn’t. What choice did he have?

“Not by yourself you can’t,” Shorter tutted. “And don’t you fucking try it, either. You’ve got Max and the rest of the grown-ups. And after what you did during the blackout, I think it’s safe to say Alex and the rest of the Mecha crew will kill anything you point at.”

Ash flinched. It wasn’t hyperbole, that last part. Which meant he had to tread even more carefully than before.

“Give it a couple of weeks, and you’ll have Sing’s support too,” Shorter continued, looking over at the shrimp proudly. “He’s a little out of it now, but he can help you with the Lee angle when he’s got his head on straight. The youngest brother, Lee Yue Lung, he did one of those fancy year-on-Earth programs a couple of years ago, and they became friends. They still keep in touch, and from what I’ve heard the kid’s not a fan of his older brothers, so he can definitely get you some intel.”

Ash’s knee-jerk response was to refuse the help entirely. Surely, surely, they could get through this without bringing a fucking thirteen-year-old into it? A thirteen-year-old that Shorter had been so adamant about keeping out of everything, even the petty conflict with Arthur? God, what kind of selfish asshole would Ash be, if he got his best friend’s baby cousin into this mess?

“I thought you said you didn’t want him in the middle of this,” he said, rattled.

Shorter laughed then, like rain in the afternoon, like Ash was being incredibly naïve. “I don’t. But I’m not gonna be around to say it anymore. And you can scream yourself hoarse telling him to butt out, but he’ll stick with you, because it’s what I would’ve done.”

And as much as Ash wanted to rail against the implications of that, he couldn’t. Because Sing Soo Ling didn’t answer to anyone but the Wong siblings, and for some reason that was beyond Ash’s comprehension, those two had decided that he was worth putting themselves on the line.

You’re family either way, Ash.

He shook Nadia’s voice out of head. “Only if there’s no other choice,” he allowed. “I’ll go to Sing only if there’s no other choice.”

“My man,” Shorter smiled appreciatively.

Shunichi called to him and Cain then, something about how they had to get going now if they wanted to get through peacefully at the airport. He acknowledged it with a nod, then stared around him mournfully, as if imprinting their surroundings into his brain.

Just so he could have the sight behind his closed eyes one day, when he was old and jaded and wished for nothing but to be young and hungry again.

Ash wondered, just a little bit envious, what that felt like. Leaving home; trading it for adventure. He didn’t know. He’d never had a home, and to call his life an adventure would be gross misrepresentation at best.

Shorter took in a lungful of air, then began to back away from Ash, close behind Cain.

“Don’t die on me, brother. And treat my boy Eiji real nice. You’ve got a good thing going with him. Don’t fuck it up.”

Ash chest tightened; a lump burned in his throat. How ironic, to ask him to promise the two things couldn’t.

“I’ll try my best.”

“Come see me, yeah? Someday. And call, too. Whenever, for whatever.”

“I will. Have fun, Shorter.”

“You know I will!”

---

It was hot.

It was hot under Ash’s shoes where their worn soles met the asphalt, it was hot where the late afternoon gusts of air blew dust and loose leaves into his face, and it was hot where Eiji’s hand rested on his waist, stabilizing Ash as he got onto his bicycle.

“There,” Eiji said, moving away so Ash could situate himself on the seat. “Now all we need is a helmet.”

He picked up the plastic thing, and Ash shied away from the obnoxious bulk of it. “You don’t wear one,” he protested.

Eiji stared Ash down, extremely unimpressed by the sentiment. “That’s because I’ve been biking for years. You, are a beginner.” He brought the helmet down on Ash’s head, then buckled it securely under his chin.

“It’s tight,” Ash complained, fidgeting with the buckle to try to keep the strap from digging into his skin.

Eiji huffed and batted his hand away from the area, tsking in Japanese as he went to adjust the strap. His cheeks puffed up and his brow furrowed in concentration as he fiddled with the tiny parts, and the way he pouted…Ash just had to kiss him; a quick peck to the corner of Eiji’s mouth just to punctuate the way his brain had lit up just then.

Neon signs all over, blinking pastel blues and pinks and purples, blaring ‘Cute! Cute! Cute!’

Eiji startled in his usual lovely, cherry-blossom-cheeked-way, then knocked on the helmet with one knuckle. Laying his forehead against it, he put one arm on either side of Ash.

And just like that, the summer day simmering in leisurely haze around them flowed past the edges of Ash’s consciousness.

There was only Eiji.

“You know you don’t have to do this, right? I’m happy to take you wherever you want to go, Aslan.”

“I know that,” Ash said, running his fingers adoringly up Eiji’s forearms. “I love when you take me places. But I still wanna learn how to ride the bike. I wanna take you places too.”

‘I want you to love when I take you places, just like I do,’ the butterflies in his chest murmured.

‘I want you to love holding onto me when we go fast, just like I do; I want you to love sneaking your hands under my shirt and doodling on that spot just above my hip when we go slow, just like I do.’

‘I want you to love…to love…’

“Okay, sweet honey. Are you ready now?”

Ash was glad for the way Eiji’s grapefruit-vanilla voice cut his thoughts short. One more second and he was sure he would have touched with his fingertips the edge of something that was not for the likes of him, something that would mangle under his clumsy, jagged intensions.

Something like ice frozen from the waters of a wishing well, something like panacea squeezed from forbidden fruit, something like a whole new universe held together by the red strings of fate.

Something that was entirely too great to wrap his head around while Eiji was smiling at him, waiting for an answer.

Ash swallowed; schooled himself back to ease. “Yeah. Ready.”

Eiji nodded, then ducked out of his personal space to go to the back of the bike. “Okay. Remember what we talked about. First two fingers on the brake pedals; second two and thumb on the handlebars, yes? Don’t lean forward too much and keep your eyes up.”

Ash repeated the instructions back to himself as Eiji knelt to push one of the pedals up and disengage the kickstand. He put one foot on the pedal, then looked back at Eiji as he held onto the seat to steady the bike. “And you…you promise you’ll hold on?”

“As long as you want me to. Watch for potholes, now. There aren’t too many on this road, but still.”

“Okay. Okay.” Ash took in a deep breath, picked one of the scraggly trees up ahead as a goalpost to focus on, then pushed off.

In hindsight, he really shouldn’t have asked Eiji to let go of the bike.

Or demanded to go down that one hill with the inconspicuous potholes. Or taken his hands off the handlebars.

Ash tried to ignore the sting of the large scrape on his elbow as he regarded the gash in his knee with distaste. It was bleeding through his jeans; the fall had had enough force behind it to rip through the denim as he’d toppled off.

Honestly, this was on Shorter.

Clearly Ash had spent too much time with the man to proceed in any rational fashion once the wind and the speed of the ride had gotten his adrenaline pumping. Of course he’d wanted to get ambitious with it the moment he’d gained any semblance of balance on top of the bicycle.

An uncharacteristically childish impulse, in hindsight.

Ash felt a little like a child, huddled in Eiji’s arms as he carried him back up to his apartment, one arm hooked under his knees and the other braced under his back. And as if the chastising pain of the cuts wasn’t enough, Eiji was giving him that look of his, that look that could be filed under the definition of ‘I told you so’ in a dictionary.

“Can you not?” Ash bit out, his voice sour. “I’ve learned my lesson alright?”

Eiji scoffed, a laugh coasting underneath the mock disapproval.

“‘Oh, look at me, I’m Aslan,” he mimicked, “and I’m so naturally talented at everything that I thought it’d be an excellent idea to take my hands off the brakes and eyes off the road while going down a hill literally two hours into learning how to ride a bike, because I’m just reckless like that and I don’t need to listen to anybody!’”

Ash fixed him with his best glare. “Babe. Drop it.”

“Drop it?” Eiji echoed, and there was far too much faux innocence on his face for Ash’s liking. “Oh, you mean like this?”

Ash squeaked most unflatteringly as Eiji tossed him a few inches into the air. He let him fall for a good three seconds before catching him deftly, spinning on his heel on the seventh-floor landing as he did so.

“Eiji!” Ash whined, latching onto his tank top with a vengeance. “I’m injured; you can’t be mean to me!”

“Alright, alright, I’ll be quiet; don’t make that face,” Eiji assuaged, sincerity laced with cinnamon. “Come on, let’s get you patched up, and then we can have a nice evening in, yes?”

Ash hmphed one last time to keep his pride, then relaxed into Eiji’s hold once more.

He was convinced he’d never get used to it; the way Eiji held him.

Like a breath. Like something he’d inevitably have to let go of; like something that would inevitably come back to him.

Delightful perpetuity.

Dawn to dusk and back again. Vapour to cloud to rain and back again. New to crescent to half to gibbous to full and back again, every single time.

Ash would call it a forever if he wasn’t such a coward.

He opened the door for them, when they came up to Eiji’s apartment at last, reaching into one of Eiji’s back pockets for the key. Eiji arranged him on the couch the moment they entered, panting with the exertion of two trips up the stairs, first carrying the bike and then him.

“Sit,” Eiji said between purposeful breaths. “I will get my first-aid kit and fresh shorts for you. We can’t clean up the cut on your knee with your jeans on.”

He moved to go towards his bedroom, but Ash tugged him down next to him on the couch. “You sit for a while too. I know you’re tired.”

Eiji didn’t need to be told twice; he collapsed half onto Ash the moment the words left his lips. But his clothes practically fused to Ash’s at every point of contact, and his hair was damp against Ash’s collarbone.

“I said sit, not drape your sweaty ass all over me,” Ash chuckled dryly, elbowing Eiji off him. “Gross.”

Eiji careened away with a dramatic groan and flopped backwards onto the cushions. “You wound me, honey.”

What a dream he was like this, sprawled languidly on the couch. His skin glowed where the summer sun had worshipped it, that unassuming strength of his rippling in the flex and pull of his muscles like ocean tides. His hair spilled onto the cushions like coffee liqueur, and when his eyes shone through the wayward strands like Venus through a storm, Ash couldn’t resist yanking him upright into a kiss.

Like molten auroras swirled into hot cocoa where their lips met, longing and sated and overwhelmed all at once. Like sacred symphony between them, decadent hums and rushed breaths building in an endless crescendo. Like oath-swearing and spellcasting everywhere they touched: traces of tenderness left in each other’s hair, fragments of fondness scattered over each other’s cheeks, sweetness swiped over each other’s necks, shoulders, waists, backs, anywhere, that would rebel against the cruel space between them.

When they could finally bear to part from each other, Eiji’s mouth was half-open in a dazed sort of smile.

“Honey.”

“Mm? I wound you, do I?” Ash asked coyly.

“You do. You know perfectly well how much you do.”

God, the way Eiji said it, so breathless and honest against his cheek. It made Ash feel magical.

“Well, now I’ve kissed you better. So, go get your stuff. Patch me up.”

Ten minutes later, Ash was wincing his way through Eiji’s first-aid administration, both legs thrown over his lap. Sometime in the middle of it, he made the stupid mistake of calling Eiji’s cleaning technique ‘sloppy’, which of course got both his cuts relentlessly prodded at with the cotton ball, just to make a point.

Menace, Eiji. Petty, Eiji. Smug fucking bastard, Eiji.

Oh, but he was forgiven.

Because he made iced tea; infused it with rose and honey just because that combination was Ash’s favourite.

Because he set them up on the couch with the radio and the table fan within reach; because he dredged up some obscure botany textbook for them to read together just for Ash’s very specific, inconsequential questions.

Because he let Ash lay on his chest and listen to his heartbeat.

Because he orchestrated ice cube races down Ash’s bare back when the temperature got to be too much for him; because he bet kisses on which ice cube would melt fast enough to cascade down to the small of Ash’s back first.

Because Eiji was the difference between heat and warmth.

There was no blistering, with him. There was no unavoidable extinguishing to worry about, with him. There was no Ash at the end of it all, with him.

Just Aslan. Only Aslan.

Chapter Text

Entry #9          Apple-Blossom Honey

The colour of devotion.

The colour of smothered dread, the colour of corrosive fire doused in caramel.

The colour of syrupy sunrays, spilling nectar, sweet nothings settling like lava inside chests.

The color of a sun swallowed by space, the colour of time stalled by the force of a gaze.

The colour of halcyon.

---

“Shit.”

“What, don’t tell me that one’s poison too? What’d be the point of making two?”

“No…no, it’s not—not poison.”

“Then what—”

“Hallucinogen. At least from what I can tell. And if…if this observational data on the jungle cats is accurate, this BANANA2 formula renders the subjects extremely suggestible, even to the smallest external stimuli.”

“Huh? That makes even less sense.”

“Uh huh. And in an astonishingly rare turn of events your previous point still stands for once: why would they need both? One’s lethal and the other’s not.”

“The only reason I’m letting that one go, brat, is because your smarts just cut my deciphering time in half.”

“Clutch your pearls on your own time, Max. We’ve got bigger problems. Like which of the formulas was put into Dawson’s FISH tech for Arthur to release into Wolfsbane’s water supply.”

“I mean, it had to be the hallucinogen, right? If it’d been the poison, the cats you and Cain saw tagged with BANANA FISH would’ve been dead.”

“Look at you; you’re two for two. Personal growth.”

“Tee-motherfucking-hee. Meanwhile, we still don’t know why any of this even happened. The fuck does Golzine have against Wolfsbane?”

“Max?”

“Yeah, kiddo?”

“…Do you think it’s…us? Us being here?”

“No. God, Ash, no. Absolutely not; get that—I don’t know where that thought came from but get it the fuck out of your head. We don’t blame ourselves for the irresponsible actions of raging maniacs like Arthur or eldritch horrors like Golzine in this house.”

“But—”

“But nothing. They were messing around in Wolfsbane and doing shady things before we even got here, remember? That’s like the whole reason we’re even here in the first place.”

“That’s not the whole reason; you and Jess have connections here; what if—”

“Even if all that is true, Ash, it still doesn’t make what they’re doing our fault.”

“…”

“Not—not everything is your fault, okay, kiddo?”

“Ash?”

“Yeah. Yeah, okay; not—not this time, I guess.”

“Not ever, Ash—”

“Yes, ever, Max. Because if we’re gonna find out for sure what really happened the night of the blackout then we—we’re gonna have to bring Sing in. Get Yue Lung to talk. And that—that’s gonna fucking be on me.”

---

“What’s that, Ash?”

“Soldering iron. Don’t touch.”

“Why not?”

“Because.”

“Because what Ash?”

“Because, Mikey.”

“Huh?”

“Ash? Ash, tell me!”

“Tell you what?”

“Why I can’t touch it.”

“I’m working right now, buddy. Can’t it wait?”

“If you don’t tell me now, I’ll tell Eiji.”

“…Dangerous. The iron is dangerous, Mikey.”

“It’s not even plugged in!”

“Doesn’t matter. Don’t touch, Mikey.”

“Fine, then what’s that?”

“Elastic.”

“And that?”

“The design.”

“And those?”

Ash looked up from the bones of the device before him, smile slight on his face as he used his pencil-holding hand to keep Michael clear of the rivets scattered before them. He was seated cross-legged on the floor, using the blue trunk in their room as his workbench for what he was sure was his magnum opus as amateur mechanic and inventor. And as much as Ash loved Michael, there were entirely too many tiny parts that wouldn’t survive the grabby-handed assault of a curious toddler, so he did what he could to shepherd Michael away.

“These,” he said, sitting Michael down so only his eyes peeked up above the edge of the trunk, “are the exact type of thing that Jess is always worried you’re gonna swallow. So don’t touch, okay?”

Michael pouted, emphatically turning his back on the whole exercise, Ash included. Ash chuckled, extending out a hand to ruffle through Michael’s hair in consolation, but determined little fingers swatted him away.

“Aw, come on, bud,” Ash said, poking him in the side. “I’m not doing it to be mean; a lot of this is just big boy stuff, okay?”

“I’m a big boy, though!” Michael protested. “I’m not even that much littler than you!”

“A decade is plenty little,” Ash pointed out, pushing up his safety glasses and his bangs along with them. Michael remained unfazed however, glaring at him with open indignation so Ash tried again.

“Here how about this, then? You can be my beta tester once this is ready, okay? You can try it on and tell me if it works well.”

Michael’s eyes lit up at the sound of that. “Really? I get to try it before Eiji?” he asked, leaping to his feet.

“’Course. We have to make sure it’s perfect before we give it to Eiji. He may not like it…or—or he could get upset if this isn’t just right.” Ash’s voice was small and shy even to his own ears. For Michael’s sake though, he weaselled some confidence into his tone. “And since you’re gonna be such a big part of the making process, we’ll say the gift is from the both of us, yeah?”

Michael grew thoughtful, as if considering the notion very seriously. Then he stood and pulled Ash’s face into his chest in a resolute hug.

“Nah, it’s still your gift,” he said, paying no mind to Ash’s startled yelp and askew safety glasses. “You’re the one who had the idea and made all the drawings for it and started working on it so early. You should be the one to give to Eiji for his birthday. Also, you like…like Eiji. Like a lot. Like more than—”

“Okay, that’s quite enough!” Ash stammered, flailing in an effort to turn his blazing face away from the child goading him, and the childishly obvious emotion of epic proportion that had taken root in his chest ever since that first day of biking lessons.

Blown-glass-precious and filigree-intricate, all tangled up with his ribs like berry-stained muslin and crystal gossamer, except it didn’t feel like a trap as much as it felt like an anchor, necessary and safe in its weight.

There was a word for it, Ash knew. But he could not speak it; would not even think it to himself.

This was enough.

Eiji in his arms, humming as he put on new dyes to boil, his hand in Ash’s own as they ran down the street, the warmth of his skin and the thrumming of his pulse against Ash’s lips when they napped together on the couch.

It was enough.

Ash could not dare to ask for more from Eiji. He’d be a selfish bastard if he asked for more. It was just not allowed. Not when…not when—

“Yo, Glenreeds! Are y’all home?”

Ash’s head snapped towards the sound of the voice, muffled though it was through the closed door of their room and the front door.

He drew in a deep breath, then steeled himself. He knew who it was, and if luck was on his side for once, then he knew why they were here.

“That’s Sing,” he told Michael. “Go let him in.”

Michael obliged with a nod, and even as Ash meticulously put away any and all evidence of the top-secret birthday present, he could hear Michael chirp excitedly about its progress to Sing. Thankfully, Sing rounded the edge of the doorframe and met Ash’s eyes in the silent understanding that none of this would get back to Eiji, so at least there was that.

He looked older, Ash realized with a pang. Barely a few weeks since Shorter and Cain had left and Sing already wore his few years like titanium and flintstone edges.

That look on his face would become armour one day, Ash could tell. And Sing seemed like he knew that; hell, with his hands in his pockets, rocking on his heels, Shorter’s old Aviation jacket thrown over top of his shoulders, Sing seemed like he’d welcome it, if for no other reason than it would make him more like his hero.

But Ash knew better than anyone that past all the theatrics and comedy, Shorter had had walls and ramparts of his own; they’d looked like ‘Home Sweet Home!’ mats, but they were there, molecularly different from Sing’s.

Shorter’s image was too larger than life to properly superimpose upon Sing, and the shrimp was too much of a straight arrow to grow into the wildly irregular Shorter-shaped hole in any of their lives.

But that was okay, because Ash could count on one hand the number of times he’d actually looked Shorter in the eyes, but Sing’s eyes were always here for all to see, unembarrassed and shark-tooth sharp when he set his mind to something. Because where Shorter was persistent, Sing was defiant; where Shorter would hold up half the sky to lighten a burden, Sing would drag Atlas back to his post by the ear just so that the burden of holding the sky up didn’t fall to anyone else in the first place.

They were both intransigent of their own volition, both formidable in their own right, despite what it looked like.

And they were both on Ash’s side of their own volition, both irreplaceable in their own right, despite what it looked like.

Ash thought about this as Sing shuffled around his side of the room, trying not to stare. Clocking the fact that this was Sing’s first time in here, Ash fought against the feeling of being on display.

“Nice sheets,” Sing commented, palm tentative on Ash’s bed as if unsure as to whether he was welcome to sit. “Didn’t know you liked…um, clouds.”

Oh, great. All his aeronautical engineering books out, four half-finished contraptions crowded on his dresser, and over two dozen ideas fleshed out in schematics and plastered on the wall above his bed, and yet Sing had decided to call attention to the one thing in his space that would fluster Ash.

Always going for the jugular, just like his older cousins.

“Those are Eiji’s,” Ash mumbled, gesturing to the now clear top of the blue trunk so Sing would get away from his bed.

“Huh.” Sing scratched behind his ear and bobbed his head like suddenly everything made more sense. Then he cracked a certain smile, and Ash instantly felt the urge to toss him out the window.

“Do Max and Jess know you guys are…. you know? Having sleepovers?”

Nope. Fuck that. Ash didn’t want to toss Sing out the window. He wanted to toss himself out the window.

“None of your damn business!” he snapped, chucking a cloud-covered pillow at Sing, who fell back onto the trunk in an effort to bat it away.

Ash didn’t understand the heat rising to his own cheeks at the insinuation. There had been no sleepovers, of the usual or implied variety. Sure, there had been afternoon naps, the occasional cuddle or even shirtless make-out when it’d been particularly…um, hot, of the—of the usual or implied variety.

It was more and more of the implied variety these days…but that was beside the point; no one was sleeping over! The sheets…Ash had simply missed a laundry day last week and Eiji had been nice enough to lend one of his spare sheets, that was it!

And so what if Ash hadn’t changed them since because he liked to fall asleep surrounded by Eiji’s scent?

Who was anyone—least of all Sing ‘Little-Mr-Disaster-Crushing-On-His-Boyfriend’ Soo-Ling—to judge?

“Just say what you gotta say and bounce; I’m busy!” Ash grumbled, going for proud and stern but ending up squeaky and juvenile instead.

“Jeez, relax Ash, I’m just making conversation,” Sing winked, thoroughly unapologetic. “I only came by to let you know that Yue Lung got back to me.”

The ire within Ash coalesced into something much graver, like pieces of bamboo hardening into granite. “And? Will he talk?”

“Only to you, only using the webcams Cyber has at school, and only if we agree to the conversation being recorded.”

Ash mulled over the terms, evaluating them for loopholes and intention. “He’s trying to keep you out of it so that your friendship doesn’t sway his judgement, he wants us in an environment that’s unfamiliar to us so the chances of us pulling a fast one on him are as low as possible, and he wants to both sides to have the conversation as leverage over the other so that nobody betrays anybody.”

Sing gaped at him, eyebrows raised. “You got all that from that?”

Ash shrugged. “It’s right there,” he said, a tad sheepish. “What’s not there is what he wants from us.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, he’s not gonna do this for us just ‘cause he’s your friend. His brothers are brutes; you said it yourself, they’d come for his neck if they found out about this. So, he must want something too otherwise he wouldn’t risk it.”

Sing sighed. “I wish I could say Yue’s not as transactional as all that, but…” He scoffed in resignation, then shook his head as he made to leave. “So, what d’you say? Will you meet him?”

Ash groaned, smushing his face into his sheets to quieten his mind. Oh, God this was such an unbelievable risk. But what choice did they have? They needed answers, and they needed them sooner rather than later.

“Yeah. Yeah, okay; I’ll meet him.”

“Great, I’ll set it up.”

“Oh, and Sing—”

“Yeah, yeah, I know the drill,” Sing pre-empted, rolling his eyes even as Ash scowled at him. “‘Not a word to Eiji or I’ll slit your throat’, blah, blah, blah. For the record, I think it’s a dick move, but whatever, it’s your funeral.”

“No one asked you!” Ash retorted, and he was knew he was right.

He hadn’t asked; he didn’t need to.

He knew it was a dick move. But it would mean Eiji’s safety.

And suffice to say, Ash was willing to do a lot worse than ‘a dick move’ if it meant keeping Eiji safe.

---

Sneaking into the Cyber building hadn’t been the hard part.

A little parkour over the gates after hours, standard combo lock on the basement door, easy-peasy, especially with Ash flying solo for this.

Not to say that the notion of him going in alone had sat well with Max or Jess, but Yue Lung had refused to so much as cough if anyone accompanied Ash, so they’d accepted being relegated to back-up outside the Academy. Provided that Ash kept them on speakerphone throughout the ordeal, of course.

It was technically, technically a violation of the terms, but what Yue Lung didn’t know wouldn’t hurt him, and Ash got the feeling he had his own violations of the terms up his sleeves anyway.

Max’s background check on the youngest Lee brother hadn’t yielded much of anything apart from the spacecraft rental company under his name, and the year on Earth which was supposed to have served as some sort of punishment for an unknown transgression. Jess had found this development frustrating, but Ash knew that the lack of information spoke for itself.

None of the Lee brothers were shrouded in that much mystery. Hell, if anything, their ace in the hole when it came to covering their asses was their incredibly prominent public presence, the harsh spotlight on which kept their less than savoury activities in the dark. But to have a Lee that was that steeped in the shadow; that removed from their glossy image…

It either meant he was the most unimportant and incompetent, or—as Ash suspected was more likely—that he was entirely too competent and thrived in secrecy in a way that was much too beneficial to the Lee agenda to be taken lightly.

He’d been hoping Sing would be more enlightening about what he’d have to expect from the kid, but all Ash had gotten out of him was a lukewarm, “Think shrill, emotionally unavailable and passive aggressive. But he has good days too.”

Which was…unhelpful, to say the least.

So yes, all things considered, sneaking into the Cyber building after hours hadn’t been the hard part.

No, the hard part was what lay ahead for Ash. Squished in the back of the basement amongst the skeletons of dismantled desktop computers, squinting thanks to the glare from the monitor before him, and watching the ‘Video Call Connecting’ message flash as the buffering circle went round and round like a pinwheel.

His heart slammed into his throat as the app dinged and the call was accepted. A new window opened, and a particularly opulent sitting room filled his screen. There was a velvet recliner, a couple of mahogany tables, a smattering of pre-colony vases full of drooping trumpet-shaped flowers, even a very large painting of a peacock that was entirely too reminiscent of Ibe’s leopard to be a coincidence, but absolutely nothing and nobody else.

“The fuck? Hello?” Ash exclaimed, scanning the image for any trace of a person, or more importantly, a trick.

“Yes, yes, hello,” a voice came from somewhere off-screen, entirely too much nonchalance and melted wax for Ash’s tastes. “Give me a moment; I’ll be right with you.”

Great. Ash was already irritated. Not an auspicious start.

“Fuck off with that; this isn’t a doctor’s appointment. You’d better get on screen in the next five seconds, jackass, or I’m taking the fact that you entertained the idea of this conversation to Wang Lung, regardless of whether we get any intel out of you.”

A spindly boy poked his head into frame then, flushed enough that Ash could tell that the glass of red wine in his hands wasn’t the first one he’d had today.

“You’d do well not to threaten me, Ash Lynx,” he said.

Ash cringed internally at the moniker but decided against a snide remark. He glowered at the boy—Yue Lung—instead.

“And you’d do well not to push my buttons. I’m almost never in a merciful mood these days.”

“Ugh, I was only getting myself another glass,” Yue Lung said, seemingly bored enough to drop it. “If you wanted me to humour your barbaric impatience you should’ve had Sing give me a heads-up.”

With that he turned his back on Ash to totter over to the recliner, and Ash studied him as he went. Yue Lung was definitely younger than him, though he got the sense that it wasn’t by a lot. Everything about him seemed to hang off his bones like vines hanging from ceiling beams. His waist-length hair shining like an oil spill, his eyelids that were shields for a needling gaze, the upturned nose and deliberately pursed lips that were sculpture-stiff in a way that was very alarming to Ash; all of the boy seemed to be encumbered by something.

He was impossible to read beyond that, which made Ash uneasy enough to fire back without thinking.

“Yeah, well, a lifetime of having scheming bastards out for your blood will do that to you.”

Yue Lung raised an eyebrow like this touched a nerve. “You don’t have to tell me that. Now, about the Lee investment in Golzine’s shenanigans—”

Ah. Here was his cue.

“Oh, no, no, no. You put your cards on the table first,” Ash said firmly. “First you tell me what you want in exchange for the information. And I’ll be the judge of the quantity and quality of intel that ask is worth.”

“That is not—”

“You got your terms met,” Ash argued. “Well, these are mine. Now meet them, or else this conversation is over.” 

Yue Lung frowned, and suddenly he was sitting up straight in the recliner. He hadn’t expected that, and Ash noted with some satisfaction that the more the implications of his conditions percolated into Yue Lung’s mind the more annoyed he got.

Damned if he did; damned if he didn’t.

If Yue Lung accepted the terms, Ash would be able to find out what skin he had in this great big game and modify his questions accordingly. He would also be in the position to reject the offer of information entirely while still being able to hold the recording of the meeting over Yue Lung’s head. And if he didn’t accept, sure, they would be none the wiser in their fight against Golzine, but the fact that the conversation was even arranged would make for sufficient enough blackmail to force Lee infighting and weaken them.

A win-win for Ash. The only question now was which of Yue Lung’s losses were greater in Yue Lung’s eyes?

A question that didn’t need to be pondered for too long, if Yue Lung’s hollow laughter was any indication.

“You know,” he said, settling back into his recliner and sprawling more than before, “when Sing said that sometimes I reminded him of you, I thought it was a thinly veiled insult. I may have to rethink some things now.”

Ash blinked at him stupidly. What, was that supposed to be a compliment? Was he meant to respond to that?

“Is this just…drunken rambling at this point?”

Yue Lung looked at him like he was the fraying edge of an expensive rug. “No. This is a formal acceptance of your terms. Now, shall we begin negotiations?”

Ash huffed, relieved. Finally. “What’re your demands, then?”

“No demands,” Yue Lung clarified with a showy flick of his wrist. “Just one, singular, demand.”

“Well?”

“I’d like my brothers destroyed.”

Ash inhaled sharply, and an all too loud hiss escaped from his pocket. Hastily he shoved his phone away from the computer’s microphone; it wouldn’t do to let Yue Lung hear any more of Max’s barely controlled hysterics.

“What, like all of them?”

“Yes,” Yue Lung said, smug in a way that puzzled Ash.

The hell was he playing at? The situation was hardly conducive to such a task right now; for one, they were all on Earth and the Lees were scattered throughout the Central Alliance colonies. And the rest…God, Ash didn’t even know how to start solving for a way out of that quagmire. Not that taking the Lees out of the equation wouldn’t be advantageous for all involved, but one Golzine was already one kingpin too many, to add six more to the mix—

Okay, okay, okay. Ash took in a measured breath.  

Refocus. Ash had to refocus on why.

Why ask this of them of all people? Why now? Why in this way? What intel did Yue Lung have that could possibly be worth such an ask? Was this all just an elaborate ploy to get Ash to drop this whole thing?

Think. Think. Think.

“‘Destroyed?’” Ash repeated on a hunch, his mind snagging on the word as he turned the response over in his mind. “Destroyed doesn’t mean dead.”

Yue Lung smiled then, like a razor blade dripping with battery acid. “No, it doesn’t. I’m sure you’ve done your research. I’m sure you know why I couldn’t possibly give over the privilege of killing them to the likes of you. The power to pass that judgement—the right—is all mine.”

“But you can’t do it alone,” Ash observed. “They quite literally own your ass. So, you want us to shoot them in the foot first so that they can’t fight back when you bring the hammer down on their heads.”

“These are the same Lees that brought Camelot and Atlantis to heel. They’ll need to be shot in more than just the foot,” Yue Lung deadpanned.

Ash pinched the bridge of his nose. How lofty, for someone with little more than a revenge fantasy.

And Ash should know. His entire life had been one warped revenge quest on autopilot.

It was high time he switched to manual control.

“Alright, alright, alright,” Ash said, the threads of an idea slowly spinning into a web in his head. “Consider the Lee brothers… ‘destroyed’, or whatever the fuck. But only one at a time, and until all six are neutralized, you will continue to supply us with information.”

“Of course,” Yue Lung said immediately, and if Ash didn’t know any better, he’d think the boy was pink with glee. “We must make it a fair trade after all.”

Ash snorted. Fair trade, his ass. But beggars couldn’t be choosers, could they? “In the interest of fairness then, start us off with some information on Golzine.”

Yue Lung placed a hand on his chest, wineglass tilted precariously, mock-appalled. “I don’t see a destroyed Lee brother yet.”

“Consider it a deposit,” Ash gritted out, saccharine in a way that had his own insides shrivelling up. “An advance, a down payment.”

He was met with amused silence for a moment, then Yue Lung spoke, jellyfish-stinger soft. “Very well then. Know this: the entire spacecraft fleet that’s supposed to be mine has been mobilized for Golzine. His cavalry will be in Wolfsbane within two months. And if Hua Lung is to be believed, he still intends to carpet-bomb the daylights out of anybody who knows anything about BANANA FISH, but he’s changed his tune about you.”

Ash froze, horror pushing through his veins like a centipede with thumbtacks for legs. “What do you mean?”

“The bounty on your head has allegedly been withdrawn.” Yue Lung’s form sagged, like he was weary; like he was sorry. “Starting now, Golzine wants you alive.”

Ash swallowed, trying not to throw up. Tinny cursing bled from his phone; Jessica, he guessed. He couldn’t be bothered to move the phone any further away, though. His fingers were limp; his insides felt gelatinous and ungainly. But still he continued, voice still as glass. “Do you know why?”

“I have a theory.”

“Care to share with the class?”

“Take down one of my brothers first, and you will have that and more.”

---

When it came to Ash’s birthdays, emotional whiplash was par for the course.

Take today: his seventeenth.

12 AM came and went without much incident. Michael fell asleep despite his promises to stay up, and Max and Jess were too busy compiling the last few weeks of research into an exposé to notice. Mainly because this exposé would bright to light Lee Wang Lung’s copious tax fraud and money laundering ventures right around the time he hosted his annual ball that pretended to fundraise for public welfare programs. Which would naturally humiliate him, immobilize his assets, and force him into house arrest while the Central Alliance dealt with the furious public, most of whom were dying like worms under the current economic situation.

The Lees were after all, just corporate extortionists without their aura of respectability and benevolence. Which was why the only way to land a fatal hit was to target their reputation.

And it was why the only people who could do the hitting were independent journalists entirely out of the reach of the colonies’ institutionalized violence.

“Why shoot Wang Lung in the foot,” Jess cackled, triumphantly jabbing the enter key as she sent off their final draft to their editor in Elysium, “when kicking him in his ball gets the same result?”

And begrudging though Ash was, he relayed the good news to Yue Lung. He had no doubt now that this was the reason Yue Lung had chosen to bargain with them of all people. It seemed there was a method to the boy’s madness.

Come 3 AM and Max handed Ash a stack of textbooks as they put all the paperwork away. Ash found that they were all part of the reading list for commercial spaceplane aeronautic engineers. He recalled lamenting once at dinner about having to wait for his senior year at the Academy to be able to read them.

“Happy birthday, kiddo,” Max said as Ash’s arms wobbled with the weight of the books and something far more complicated. “Do us proud.”

At 5 AM however, that cotton-fuzz had already disappeared from inside his chest. Now Ash was using Jessica’s janky old laptop and the malware they’d planted years ago to hack into Golzine’s bank accounts, reroute the Alliance’s secret funds and short the stocks of one of his companies while he was at it. Granted, it was like cutting off a hydra’s head; it would only delay Golzine’s descent upon Wolfsbane, not prevent it. But they needed every extra second they could get. Especially if they were finally going to break the story that…that…

Well, that Griff had died in pursuit of.

God, Ash hated thinking about him right then; he didn’t need his mind freezing up in the middle of electronic warfare. Most days he didn’t like the way his brain worked. But in moments like these, he was glad for its usefulness, even if there was just the slightest tremor of fear under all of Max and Jess’ awe for what he was capable of. He didn’t need that usefulness tempered by all the murky loss that the idea of Griff was shrouded in.

They had a birthday breakfast at 7.30 AM, that Michael woke up for and orchestrated to a T, jumping up on the kitchen island and ordering Max and Jess about like a hurricane in a onesie. Avocado toast and pancakes were made, and a great big cookie cake was brought out. It didn’t take a genius to recognize whose sugar cookie recipe had been used, and Ash blushed at his feet while the birthday song was sung. He also read the card Michael had prepared for him six times before eating a single bite.

By 9 AM he was falling asleep on his feet, as were Max and Jess thanks to their all-nighter, but they only decided to crash after Yue Lung’s message came through. It seemed the story about Wang Lung was already getting the man drawn and quartered in civic discourse, and everyone was seeing the writing on the wall, Yue Lung included. And so here was his intel, as promised, pinging on Ash’s phone as he flopped down onto his bed.

The hallucinogen is for the colonies. Golzine wants to make money off the Central Alliance by promising BANANA FISH to the leadership.

The poison is for Earth. The colonies are strapped for resources again; the rich have been eating a little too much lately. They’re going to force a culling one of these days, courtesy of Golzine and the research and thugs he’s financed…

There was more, but Ash could not see it; his vision was swimming. He turned his phone off, trying to process all that he’d read. He could almost feel the knife’s edge of fate at his throat, now that he could fully comprehend just how narrowly they had all escaped.

That night…the night of the blackout…

Arthur was going to doom them all, everyone in fucking Wolfsbane, just by putting BANANA FISH in the water. Thanks to everyone’s help Ash had managed to thwart his plans, but what if…

What if he tried it again? What if he was plotting to do it again right this second?

An image flashed before Ash’s eyes then.

The graduation after-party atop the hell-mountain.

The never-ending sky, the stubbornly surviving buildings spread out under him like a maze.

Alex embarrassing himself trying to dance. Cain sharing his Ma’s stories from when she lived in Euphorbia across the sea. Bones’ laughter whistling out of the gaps in his teeth.

The distortion from the evening haze. The saturation of the citrusy light.

Kong’s soulful rendition of a lullaby to sagging jazz. Shorter’s flower crown flying off his head as he twirled by himself, the wind pulling off the petals like raindrops.

The Academy. The spaceplanes neatly tarped up on the roof of the Aviation building. All the howling and hooting.

Eiji.

Eiji holding him in the pool, his heart’s steady music louder in Ash’s ears than all the dissonance around them. Water slicking back his hair, the death of spring and the promise of summer shimmering in his eyes, plum-soaked decadence on his lips despite the fruit shortage because Eiji was just magic like that.

Made of cloud, soft and fast. Made of sun, warm and bright. Made of Earth, unyielding and brimming with life.

Fuck, Arthur had to die, didn’t he?

Ash would kill him if he tried anything in Wolfsbane again. That went for Golzine too.

He’d protect this place, these people, with everything he had.

Enough had been taken from him. Ash would not let them take this too. Wolfsbane was his, just like it was everyone else’s that he cared for.

This was the last thought on his mind before his face hit the pillow and he fell into a dreamless sleep, the half-closed tarp on the window keeping out the climbing morning sun.

Jess woke him up ten minutes before 1 PM. Apparently the Mecha crew, Sing and Nadia had come by with lunch. Ash remembered thinking it was odd, as he was dragged out to greet his guests with eyes still unfocused.

They were supposed to come by for dinner not lunch.

Oh, well. He supposed they wanted to surprise him. Which was…nice, it was fine; it was very sweet and all that; he got Nadia’s cooking, the company of all his friends and even birthday wishes from Shorter and Cain that Sing had specially transcribed from their space transmissions, so it wasn’t like he was complaining or anything but—

But…

But Eiji was supposed to come with them.

He’d promised Ash a great dinner and a surprise.

Well, here the surprise was he guessed. But where was Eiji?

Ash hadn’t had anything from him yet, not since that one ‘Happy happy birthday, honey!’ text at 12.03 AM. He knew for sure he hadn’t, because ever since the sun had come up, Ash had been checking his phone constantly. Even at the lunch table, to make sure he wasn’t missing anything. The only reason he’d stopped was because Alex saw and reassured him that Eiji had only been called away by Shunichi on some minor emergency this morning, and that Ash would see him after lunch.

Which only served to make Ash splutter self-consciously and turn up his nose at the snickering table, with the insistence that “It’s fine; it’s not like I’m crumbling to pieces here or anything!” And kind of curse Shunichi out in his head.

Because why? So many days in the year and yet somehow, he had to choose Ash’s birthday to have emergencies that apparently could not be overcome without Eiji?

Ash would pout about it if Eiji was there to kiss it away.

But despite his boyfriend’s absence it was a lovely lunch, and Ash soon found himself slipping into a good enough mood to properly enjoy his party along with everyone else. So much so that he even strong-armed his way into the kitchen to do the dishes as a thank-you for the wonderful time.

And that was where Ash was standing, about half-way through rinsing the plates, fingers prune-y under the water and clutching a washcloth, when he heard three sharp honks of a car.

Specifically, Shunichi’s car.

He looked up, puzzled. “The hell? Is that—”

More honks, this time in couplets. Ash looked around the room, and everyone looked back at him, waiting for his reaction.

“Well?” he asked, raising his eyebrows. “Isn’t anyone gonna go see what’s going on?”

“Maybe you should,” Bones suggested, wiggling his own.

Ash sent him a withering look, but went over to the window when no one deigned to move. He felt their eyes on his back as he poked his head out, and sure enough, there was Shunichi’s car, parked right outside their building.

“Shunichi?” Ash yelled, confusion mounting by the second. “That you? Is everything okay?”

No answer, save for three insistent honks.

Ash turned back to the living room, his face scrunched. “Maybe you should go downstairs and see,” Alex pushed awkwardly, like he had a secret stuck in his teeth.

“And bring your wallet. And your keys,” Sing added. “And like…spare shorts.”

Okay. Ash had had enough of all their knowing smiles.

He promptly turned on his heel and left the apartment, grabbing his Aviators on the way but ignoring Sing’s advice out of spite. It didn’t take him more than a couple of minutes to stomp down the stairs, and soon enough he was bursting through the main door and onto the street.

Onto the street where Shunichi’s car sat, windows rolled down and engine purring. Only it wasn’t Shunichi behind the wheel.

It was Eiji.

Arms spread out as if to say ‘ta-da!’, his smile like tame lightning, wearing that faded mint-green button-up that always got Ash’s insides fizzing and popping like there was ice-cream soda in his chest.

“Hello, birthday boy!”

In that moment, Ash forgot all his exasperation, all his disorientation, all those strange looks that he didn’t want to read from upstairs. Scattered questions trickled into his mind and out of his mouth, laced with laughter both disbelieving and sweet.

“What the—when on—is this—how…uh…how?”

The wattage of Eiji’s face dimmed some then, his aura diffused and indulgent like a golden nightlight. “Ibe-san gave me lessons. I wanted to learn, just for today.”

‘Just for you’, Ash heard unspoken. He looked on, mouth half-open, as Eiji reached forward, and disengaged the passenger side door. “What do you say, Aslan? May I take you on a very special birthday drive?”

Oh, that look on Eiji’s face. All sincerity and tinsel and snow under a buzzing streetlight.

How could Ash possibly pass up this opportunity to mess with him?

He strolled up to the open passenger side window and ducked into the car, shutting the ajar door in the process. “Hm, I don’t know about that; you did leave me all by myself for half the day. But I’m feeling merciful right now, so I could certainly be persuaded to give you a chance. Tell me, where will you take me?”

He’d expected that to have rattled Eiji some, to have made him all wide-eyed and cute and apologetic, but Eiji didn’t even fucking flinch. Instead, he leaned right back towards Ash, a confident tilt to his grin as he caught his eyes. “The beach. You’ve never seen the ocean up close, right?”

The coy look instantly fell off Ash’s face, his charade decimated in favour of genuine wonder. “Will we swim?”

“We will do whatever you want,” Eiji promised, holding his gaze like the very doorway to the universe lay in his eyes. It made Ash tremble like a song on a breeze. “There is a great little lagoon if you want to swim, there is the entire coastline if you want to walk. I have a blanket if you want to lay down, and the radio if you want music, and that novel we started on Wednesday if the end of Chapter 12 is still on your mind. I brought dinner too, so if you want to stay past sunset and watch the stars come out, then we will do that too. Anything, Aslan.”

Ash shook his head, biting back what he was sure would be a very high-pitched very mortifying whimper.

God, Eiji was just erosive in all the gentlest, headiest, most unchangeable ways, wasn’t he?

Like rivers on rocks, cooling, soothing, tempering edges. Like suns splitting open asteroids, too much warmth for something so brittle. Like time on trees, pulling away leaves and pushing up flowers, ripening fruit only for the sweetness to grow so heavy that it had to be abandoned to fauna and the lonely ground.

Eating away at Ash’s façade, turning his brain to mush, making him feel so damn treasured—

Ash barely registered the car door opening, all he knew was that he was currently not in Eiji’s arms, and that was a fucking travesty, so he simply willed his hands to rectify the situation. And the next thing he knew he’d flung himself into the car and onto Eiji, arms around his neck and lips pressed to his cheek, to hell with the steering wheel and the gearshift and every other thing in their way.

It was all small, all minuscule, all utterly irrelevant.

Nothing mattered to Ash, not more than Eiji.

And from the way Eiji giggled and ran his hands through Ash’s hair, the way he whispered in Ash’s ear so maddeningly low, “Do you like your surprise, honey?”, Ash knew, he could feel, that nothing mattered to Eiji more than him too.

And what a feeling it was.

---

They drove for about an hour and half, until Wolfsbane lay behind them instead of all around them.

Windows down, Ash’s feet up on the dashboard, a snack bag of figs balanced in his lap. The distant roaring of waves, Eiji’s easy one-handed hold on the steering wheel that left his other hand available for Ash to loosely intertwine with his own. That hand that retreated for gear changes, but always came back, sure and affirming and beautifully real.

Their meandering game of ‘Twenty Questions’ kept devolving into semantic fact-checking on Ash’s part and eyerolls and sugary sarcasm on Eiji’s part, so they gave it up in favour of playing ‘Would You Rather?’

Only for them to give that up too, on account of all the “You can’t just have the octopus and the eel fight each other, Eiji; you have to pick one to fight you!” and Eiji kissing on Ash’s wrists when he bit into the figs Ash proffered him. A random act of affection that did nothing but blank out Ash’s brain, of course, and that was annoying, because how was he even supposed to function, let alone entertain any cognitive thought while Eiji’s lips were making his pulse jump in his veins? How was he supposed to consider the questions and play the game that Eiji suggested they play when Eiji’s teeth were nibbling on the heel of his palm every time he took a bite out of a fig?

“You’re the worst!” Ash whined when the pecks became focused on his fingers.

And Eiji simply paused, smirked at the way Ash didn’t withdraw the hand that was now empty of a fig but still held up expectantly to his mouth, and sang, “Liar!”

Good God.

Minx, Eiji. Tease, Eiji. Smug fucking bastard, Eiji.

Eiji, that Ash would not have any other way.

His lovely Eiji that he would not change for the world, that he would not trade for the universe, that he would not give up even if it killed him.

His incredible Eiji that Ash would absolutely hold responsible for this torment the moment they got to the beach.

As it turned out, he couldn’t get to it as soon as the car stopped; Eiji parked just by the concrete overhang where the road ended and the beach began, and Ash was too mesmerized by the sight to fixate on that.

Coarse, dark sand smoothed flat by lapping waves, the colour stark against the sea’s despite the depth of the water. Like a blanket of night Ash thought that sea was, a blanket of night out of which climbed wave upon giant wave, crowned with foaming white like wisps of cloud. And close to the horizon there was the sun, throwing a glittering strip of pastel yellow over the surface of the water.

The whipping wind that smacked of salt, the abundant sea glass strewn over every visible inch of land like the inside of a kaleidoscope, the receding daylight that turned everything to eternal amber, every detail was so visceral, so relentless upon the senses that it flooded Ash’s very being, and he found himself dragging Eiji out to explore before they’d even had time to unload the car.

They went for a walk first, though Ash supposed chasing the waves as they pulled back only to run away from them as they came into the coast didn’t count for much of a walk.

“Jesus Christ babe, are there dynamos in your ankles that I don’t know about?” Ash groused after waves had splattered against his shins for the fourth time, even as Eiji skipped out of range with ease. “How are you that fast?”

“Being a good runner is bare minimum for being Vitae,” Eiji replied modestly. He jogged back to Ash, then swept him off the ground in a half-spin by his waist. “Either that, or you’re just too slow, Aslan,” he laughed into the sparse space between them.

And despite the way Ash’s arms were wrapped around his neck, despite the tender brush of their noses, Ash found the wherewithal to push at his chest in protest. “Put me down, asshole!”

“As you like,” Eiji grinned, releasing his hold so abruptly that Ash landed in a stumbling heap. “Especially since you lost. And according to your bet, whoever gets tagged three times by the waves gives the winner a piggyback ride to the lagoon. So—” Eiji clasped Ash wrist and twisted him around, pulling a screech out of him as he jumped up on his back— “I think it is my turn to be carried around now, yes?”

“Hey—Eiji—fuck!” Ash scrambled to gain his balance, pulling Eiji’s knees snug around his waist despite how he staggered. “Too heavy!”

“Too delicate!” Eiji shot back, nipping at his earlobe with that smile that could extinguish a wildfire. Funny, how by the same token it was enough to start one within Ash’s blood.

He tackled Eiji to the ground for that, held him there till the breaking waves soaked them both, kissed him in place until he forgot all about that piggyback ride.

“Sore loser, aren’t you?” Eiji said, breathless when he pulled away.

“And what?” Ash dove in for another kiss, teeth catching playfully on Eiji’s bottom lip when it ended too soon. “Even if I was—which I’m not but even if I was—you don’t look too worse for wear to me.”

“Oh please.” Eiji twirled a lock of his hair around one finger, then tugged till Ash kissed him again. “You know how well you wound me, honey.”

Mm, that look in his eyes. Caramel melting solid dark chocolate, glowing magma melting stone, freshly brewed tea melting the harsh ice within Ash with every blink. Ash was so irrepressibly charmed, so awfully fond, and yet—

Yet he simply could not pass up this chance. This chance to get revenge for all that sappiness in the car.

He pushed off Eiji before those deceptively strong arms had any time to react and leapt to his feet. Eiji hardly had time to sit up, looking all rumpled and bereft and so fucking adorable, before Ash was bounding out of reach. “Well, if you can catch me before I get to the lagoon, maybe I’ll consider wounding you some more!”

“You’re mean, Aslan!”

“Say what? Sorry babe, you’re gonna have to get closer if you want me to hear!”

“Such a brat, Aslan you—”

Obviously, Ash lost that race.

Not that he was trying too hard to win. And the way Eiji yanked him into the lagoon and splashed him until both the sweat and adrenaline washed off made it all worth it anyway. It was always worth it, just to end up in Eiji’s arms, to be held with a tenacity that sought to ward away anyone or anything that threatened to shatter the closeness.

It made Ash giddy, to know that it was requited. The intensity with which he wanted Eiji, it was so acutely, unrepentantly, requited.

After their swim, they put down the blanket to lounge on while the bulk of their clothes dried. Ash relaxed into Eiji’s chest while the latter towelled off his hair, only slightly regretting dismissing Sing’s advice to bring spare shorts. The ones Ash currently had on prickled with every bit of saltwater that evaporated off it, which made him squirmy, but the cosy hearth that was Eiji rendered him boneless altogether, so he tried his best to ignore the feeling.

He looked between the sea and the lagoon instead, truly taking in the sharp difference between their colours now that he wasn’t wearing his Aviators. Ash had put them on Eiji’s face on a whim, but doing that had ended up showing him why Eiji avoided sunglasses. Even without Eiji’s minor myopia, the world would never look quite right, quite true to him, with sunglasses on. The hues would become mangled thanks to the protective tint on the lenses, and Ash could imagine that irking the part of Eiji that was so fascinated by the world’s innate vividity.

The comforting scratch of the towel in Ash’s hair halted, and he turned to press a thank-you kiss to Eiji’s collarbone. Snuggling close to him when his arm came forward to circle his middle, Ash felt Eiji bury his nose in his hair and inhale audibly.

“It suits you, this sea-and-sand smell,” Eiji said, his voice airy and devastating.

Ash tried for his most petulant frown, though he suspected the ghost of the red-cheeked smile shone through anyway. “You don’t like the way I smell otherwise?”

Eiji flicked the tip of his nose. “Misinterpreting twit. More than one smell can suit a person. But for what it’s worth, I think your usual engine-oil-and-lemon-bar-soap smell is wonderful too.”

“Why?”

Ash thought he’d phrased it like a challenge, but Eiji’s face took on a wicked grin at the sound of that. “Fishing for compliments, Aslan?”

“Wha—hey do I not have my rights, as the birthday boy?” Ash squawked, floundering for an excuse.

“Yes, that is a good point,” Eiji allowed, comically serious, and Ash shifted in his arms enough to peek up at his face.

Eiji’s shoulders slumped, almost helplessly so, like the answer he was about to give was the only one that could be given. “I think it’s wonderful because it’s yours, honey. I…I like everything about you.”

‘That’s because he doesn’t know everything about you,’ a grating voice at the back of Ash’s mind reminded. ‘I bet if he knew he’d take all that strawberry-champagne devotion right back, because you don’t fucking deserve it, you lying piece of—’

“I like everything about you too,” Ash’s mouth said, louder than whatever that voice could come up with next, surer than whatever it could come up with next. “Everything about you is so amazing that sometimes I can barely believe that—that I get to be with you.”

Ironic, for someone who relied so greatly on his mind, Ash had been largely disregarding what it’d been inundating him with these days.

Because these days, this summer, was theirs. His and Eiji’s. All theirs, just theirs; Eiji had sworn it to him. And Ash would be damned if he’d let that stupid voice ruin those.

“You take the words right out of my mouth, honey,” Eiji said, kissing his shoulder where the sun had reddened it.

Ash laughed thickly. “I thought I wounded you.”

“Yes, well, you do that too,” he conceded with a giggle.

“You make me sound like a handful.”

“Even so. I like everything about you, Aslan. I always have, since the day I met you.”

God, Ash was selfish. He knew he was taking from Eiji, stealing from him. He fucking knew, felt the regret and shame of it in the back of his throat at all times, and yet—

And yet he was going to do it anyway.

He was going to douse all that bitterness in the butterscotch-solar-flare taste of Eiji’s lips and burrow into Eiji’s chest until the cruel world went dark; he was going to push those fucking Aviators out of Eiji’s face because fuck, they hid those eyes that made the expanse of space pale in comparison and Ash just couldn’t stand it anymore, because those eyes, they showed so earnestly who Eiji was, and they were so fucking stunning because Eiji was just so fucking stunning and Ash just—

He felt at home with Eiji.

How…

How could he give that up, for some stupid voice in his head?

---

It had been Ash’s idea to stay for the moonrise, but now that the white globe was actually coming up the horizon, neither of them were paying attention.

How could they be, wrapped up as they were in each other.

In the car, the music on the radio fading in and out of static, long forgotten. The leftovers of their salad and sandwich dinner carefully stowed away where it wouldn’t get in the way.

On the backseat, reclined as far as it would go, Eiji’s body pressed into it as Ash straddled his waist.

Out of the sea-breeze chill and drenched in warmth. Warmth just shy of melting where Eiji’s fingers pushed under Ash’s shirt, caressed the small of his back, massaged circles into his hips. Such delicious warmth, so exquisitely stifling where their lips met and breaths mixed that Ash couldn’t help but move closer and closer.

Both his hands in Eiji’s hair, a part of him crowding with the desire to touch more—trace the curve of those cheeks, find that spot on Eiji’s neck where his pulse was strongest, skim over the firm planes of that chest now that all the buttons of his shirt were undone. But Eiji’s hair was too soft, it spilled too plentifully over his fingers, and Eiji hummed this addictive, husky sort of hum whenever Ash pulled on it just right, and God, he just couldn’t let it go.

Especially not when Eiji’s mouth was moving away from his own to map out the sides of his face, his jaw, and his neck with agonizingly slow, half-ticklish, damn near worshipful kisses. Ash tilted his head back, chasing that feeling of being cherished so thoroughly, so attentively that every appreciative whine, every hitched breath, every approving, urging hair pull that gave away his favourite spots was duly noted with a nuzzle and more pecks to the area. Just so that Ash could be kissed the way he liked best when those plush lips inevitably came back for an encore.

Blue fire under his skin, volcano in his chest, comet dust clouding his brain—

God, Ash felt like he was going full supernova; he was so happy.

And that joy bubbled out of him as Eiji kissed his way back up from the hollow of his throat to his mouth, all that laughter too loud for this tiny sanctuary of theirs.

“What is it?” Eiji asked, smiling up at him, moon-bright and twice as heavenly.

Ash shook his head, the truth in his heart still too raw for words. “Nothing; nothing at all. Just…never pegged you for the type of guy to make out in the back of your boss’ car.”

He felt Eiji’s palm squeeze his thigh in reprimand, though when he met Eiji’s eyes they sparkled with mischief.

“What can I say, honey?” he said, extricating one of Ash’s hands from his hair just so he could place it over his heart. “You make me brave. You make me reckless.”

And just like that, Ash’s eyes filled with tears.

He closed them just in time, kissed Eiji back before they spilled over, because hell on Earth he would not have a goddamn explanation if Eiji saw them and asked what was wrong.

Because if anyone was making anyone else reckless, it was Eiji making Ash reckless.

What the fuck was he doing honestly? What rational sense did it make to be spending this languid, seemingly never-ending seventeenth birthday with his boyfriend when Ash wasn’t even fucking normal enough for it? What right did he have to this bliss when he’d been plotting death and ruin upon Golzine and the Lees less than twenty-four hours ago?

Tensions were high; they were all teetering on a tightrope between a ten-thousand-foot-drop and a fiery abyss and a pit of vipers what with Arthur still out there, and here Ash was, sitting in Eiji’s lap because—

Because what, he wanted to?

What kind of reckless-ass, irresponsible-ass person was he to want something like that?

How could he put Eiji in this much danger when his mere presence meant—when his entire fucking existence had only ever caused trouble for all involved?

Yet even as he asked himself those questions, Ash knew that train of thought was futile. He knew why; he knew how.

Him and Eiji, that was just…gravity; mutual gravity; it was just that fundamental.

At least for him.

But with a force strong enough that was applied in the right direction, even gravity could be overcome.

Which meant—it meant that this could still fall apart.

Because a supernova, though bright, is still an explosion. It is still a collapse.

Was that what was happening now? Was this going to collapse too, was it going to be yanked away from Ash just like everything else was?

Ash didn’t know, and it made him feel like he had nothing but bullet-riddled glass tubes for bones.

And he just couldn't stand feeling like that. Not anymore.

He’d grown too soft now, to carry that feeling around inside him like it didn’t matter.

“Eiji…” he rasped when their kisses had slowed to a lazy pace. “Eiji?”

“Hm?”

“What is this?”

Eiji moved just enough out of his space to see his face, more non-plussed than anything else. “This what, honey?”

Yeah, no, Ash couldn’t bear to look him in the eyes for this. He crumpled into Eiji, hiding his face in the space where Eiji’s shoulder joined his neck even as Eiji’s arms moved to envelop him.

“This. Us,” Ash whispered desperately. “What is it?”

He felt Eiji stiffen, hands frozen on his back, and Ash couldn’t help but coax him even closer. It made the jagged points of his splintering insides dig into his soul, yet he did it anyway. Because if this was going to be the last time Eiji let him do this, then Ash wanted his heart to beat in time with Eiji’s, just one more time.

Air rushed into his lungs when Eiji’s hands moved again, this time to card through his hair, just the way he liked. Something fluttered within him, frail and hopeful.

“It can be whatever you want it to be, Aslan,” Eiji said, his voice lilting and mist-like, yet strained in a way that was almost too kind. “I know what it is to me, but if you—”

“What is it to you? Tell me.”

‘Don’t hold back,’ Ash thought. ‘Tell me this truth that makes you sound so enchanting, so nervous. Tell me this truth that is so intense that it makes you doubt if I want to hear it.’

“It’s a forever, Aslan. For my part, at least.”

Eiji’s finger nudged under his chin and brought Ash’s eyes to level with his own.

“My words may not mean much now; we are still very young. But always remember, what I feel for you, it is permanent. It is to the world’s end and beyond; it is forever.”

In hindsight, it was really stupid of Ash to think he wasn’t going to cry at some point today.

But even still, he didn’t expect the full-bodied wail to burst forth from his lips as he clung to Eiji, fierce and shaking with the carnage of the words, fierce and shaking with the relief of the sentiment.

The sentiment that Ash’s soul unequivocally returned; the sentiment that he could not voice lest he curse this fearlessly breath-taking boy with a fate worse than death. Ash couldn’t, he just couldn’t, not when said boy had accorded him the privilege of holding his heart in his clumsy, clawing hands.

“Fuck you, Eiji,” Ash wept. “You’re the absolute fucking worst.”

And Eiji, miracle that he was, laughed like harps in paradise, and dried Ash’s tears and pet his hair and cuddled him till he was smiling again.

“My light in the dark, Aslan. My apple-blossom honey, Aslan.”

---

There were only twelve minutes of Ash’s birthday left when they finally got back home.

All their stuff still in the car because they couldn’t be bothered with anything but each other. Dragging their feet on their way up the stairs, quiet because it was late, quiet because the air between them felt charged with a new kind of electricity, quiet because they knew what was coming next, and they didn’t like it one bit.

Ah, here it was, despite their best efforts. The sixth floor. Ash’s place.

Eiji stalled a respectful distance from the closed door and slackened his hold on Ash’s hand enough for him to be able to let go whenever he’d like. He motioned for Ash to go on, so endearingly reluctant.

“Happy birthday, honey.”

Ash’s gaze swept over him as he pressed one last kiss to Ash’s knuckles, lingering and chaste.

There was barely any moonlight here on the darkened landing, but Eiji was still radiant, almost as if the shadows knew better than to touch him.

His hair that somehow still seemed artfully dishevelled, even though Ash had moved his hands through it with wild abandon. His right arm that could pick Ash up all by itself, his left arm that always joined in anyway because he liked to properly hold Ash. His special green button-up that Ash felt looked best against his skin, his skin that always smelled of flowers, but smelled like ocean today.

His skin that Ash knew smelled like him now, his mouth that Ash knew tasted of him.

The memory of Eiji like this would never leave him, Ash was certain.

But this memory wasn’t enough—not that anything ever would be when it came to Eiji—but especially not after today.

Ash couldn’t just walk away after everything that had happened today.

So instead of dropping Eiji’s hand and moving towards his front door, he tightened his grip, and moved towards the next flight of stairs.

The one that lead up to the seventh, eighth, ninth floor. Up to Eiji’s place.

“Don’t wanna sleep without you tonight,” was as eloquent as Ash was going to get with a question like this one, so he climbed up a few steps and pulled on their joined hands just to make things one hundred percent clear. “Yeah?”

And Eiji, oh, the way his eyes gleamed.

Space romanticized, Ash had thought, when they’d first met.

He knew better now. You could romanticize the great void of the universe till kingdom come and still fall short.

Those eyes, there was nothing like them in existence.

Only one Eiji; only one pair of eyes that could make Ash ache with such longing even though they were barely a foot apart.

“What about your parents?” Eiji breathed. “Will they not mind if you—”

“No.” Ash cleared his throat and stared down at his feet. “No one said I couldn’t have um, sleepovers, so long as I text and let them know.”

“Well, in that case—”

Ash stifled a surprised squeak as Eiji scooped him up into his arms, rocking them back and forth before beginning to carry him up the stairs. He was so full of overflowing delight that it made Ash want to just drown in him. His fingers curled into Eiji’s shirt collar and his legs wrapped around Eiji’s waist, ankles locking behind his back so that Ash could keep that ardour all to himself.

Not that Eiji seemed inclined to give it away to anyone else, but fuck, Ash didn’t even want it to accidently escape into the air.

It was just for him. Eiji said so.

“Fuck, babe, you shouldn’t be this nice to me.”

“Shh. I care about you, and I will do anything I can to make you happy. End of story.”

Yes. Ash wished it could be.

Everything would be so perfect if things were that simple.

---

Remember when Ash said he liked everything about Eiji?

Yeah, he lied. That wasn’t true.

How could it be, when Eiji was an unfailing, insufferable morning person that had the nerve to leave his boyfriend all alone in bed just because the stupid sun came up?

Ash rolled over in Eiji’s bed, groaning into the pillows as he felt around for Eiji and came up empty. He cracked open one eye, then immediately closed it thanks to the butter-yellow light streaming in through the window.

What time was it? Eight? Nine?

Ash didn’t care much; all he cared about was that Eiji apparently thought a meagre blanket would be enough to placate him. As fucking if, especially after the way Eiji had held him last night, so all-consuming with tender want.

Ash didn’t think he’d ever be able to fall asleep without Eiji now.

Oh well. At least the ducky pyjamas were still with him.

Or at least the top half that he was wearing anyway. Stupid Eiji had taken the bottom half and gone God knows where.

Ash felt a little ridiculous wearing those dorky ducks in the light of day, but they were easily the most luxurious thing in Eiji’s closet, and his favourites to boot. Not to mention Eiji always wore them on dye-making nights so they were steeped in his dizzying floral scent. Ash manoeuvred himself so the fabric of the pyjama top would push against his nose and breathed deeply.

Mm, that was better. Eiji.

God, Ash was going to sulk so hard if he’d actually gone out for his run.

Though when Ash rubbed his eyes and sat up, his senses getting less bleary by the minute, he realized that that probably wasn’t the case. He could hear the bubbling of boiling water past the ajar bedroom door.

Ah, so just making tea then. Well, Ash supposed he could forgive him.

He could use a hot drink, and Eiji always cleared a spot for him to sit on the kitchen counter whenever he cooked. Maybe Ash could go out and join him. But he was just so comfy here…

“Eiji? Babe, come back to bed!” he called, hand absently going to his hair to straighten out his bedhead.

He blushed as his fingers met petals; Eiji had put a black pearl rose in his hair last night.

So satiny in his hands as they fell off the flower, Ash gathered all the petals up and lay them reverently on the pillow. He was going to press them and what remained of the rest of the rose into one of his textbooks again, so he could keep this memento of his seventeenth birthday forever.

“Babe, seriously, can you bring the tea to bed?” Ash said, louder this time. The water was still boiling, but Ash hadn’t gotten an answer. “I wanna hang out in here!”

Nothing.

“Eiji?”

Silence.

Too much silence, Ash realized with a sickening jolt. All he could hear was the boiling water. Where were the rest of the sounds? The clacking of the mugs, the rustle of ingredients pulled out of bags, the open-and-shut of the cabinet doors and—

And Eiji’s voice.

He sang when he made tea. Always the same song, something about a clementine that Shunichi had heard from Max and taught him when he was a kid.

Only there was no singing now. Just silence.

Which meant that—

NO.

Ash jumped out of the bed, refusing to even finish that train of thought. Suddenly, the cheery sunlight felt eerie; the pleasant quiet he’d woken up to felt deathly. Even the scent of Eiji’s ducky pyjamas felt sickly, and Ash hurriedly shucked them off his body in favour of his own clothes.

He ran around the apartment, calling Eiji’s name as he went, over and over until it sounded less like music and more like a shriek. When he was absolutely sure Eiji wasn’t there, Ash made a beeline for the kitchen, and the pot of water on the stove that was still bubbling.

Looking inside it, Ash found that there was only a centimetre of water left. The rest of it had boiled away.

Which meant that it had been sitting on the stove for at least forty-five minutes, if not more.

And that…that was not normal, not for brewing tea.

So that meant—it meant that something had interrupted Eiji before he could take it off the heat.

Something, or…or someone.

Dread curdled within Ash as he switched off the stove and ran back to the bedroom. He turned all the sheets topsy-turvy as he fumbled for his phone, forcing his trembling fingers to co-operate. A quick check revealed no messages from Eiji that would explain where he might have gone, and that was when panic truly began to close around Ash’s throat like a noose.

Something was wrong. He could just feel it; something had gone wrong.

Eiji might leave him in bed for a few minutes to fix a meal, but he would never vanish on Ash without an explanation. Ash knew him well enough to know that.

Which meant something had fucking gone wrong.

God, how could he not have noticed; how could he have kept sleeping; how could he ever have let Eiji go in the first place—

Ash collected his things and made for the front door, the sole thought in his head that he had to find Eiji. He threw it open, only to collide into another body, equally as frantic, in just as much disarray as him.

“Max!” Ash exclaimed, steadying himself on the man’s shoulders. “Good, you’re here; listen, have you seen Eiji? Because I don’t know where—”

“Kiddo.”

The word came out distraught, disfigured, as if the very act of speaking had ripped it to shreds. Ash balked; never in his life had he seen Max look like this, the blue in his eyes lost amongst wearied grey, his movements like a haunted ragdoll’s as he held up a note to Ash’s face.

The thud of Ash’s heartbeat nearly cratered his chest when he recognized Arthur’s handwriting.

“I found that on Mikey’s bed,” Max said, fingers raking through his hair when Ash snatched the thing from his hands. “Him and Jess are both gone too.”

Three hostages for three fingers, the note read. Come to the power plant with everything you have on BANANA FISH by sunset or I’m gonna start chopping off body parts.

Oh. Oh, Ash was going to kill him.

If there was so much as a scratch on any of them, the first chance Ash got; he was going to kill Arthur in a way that people would never forget.

“Call Charlie, Max. Strategy meeting at Chang Dai in an hour. I’ll meet you there.”

“The hell you will; I’m not letting your ass out of my sight!”

“Divide and conquer, Max. You taught me that. Plus, we’ll save time this way.”

“What d’you need time for; where do you wanna go?”

“Alex’s neighbourhood, eventually. We’re gonna need him and the rest of the Mecha crew too if we’re gonna pull this off. But first, I’m going downstairs. I need to get my gun.”

Chapter Text

Entry #10        Blood Orange

The colour of wickedness.

The colour of bitten-off screams, the colour of haemorrhaging volcanos.

The colour of poisoned cider, permanent stains, perforated viscera.

The colour of wilted roses, the colour of sweetness cut with tungsten.

The colour of wrath.

---

Dizzy, dizzy, disoriented. Tears in his mouth. Fists full of sweater. It smelled like lemons.

Jess’ voice— “Go, go, go!”—gristle still clinging to it, crumbling like old cement. Max’s heartbeat against his where he was held to Max’s chest; handgun digging into his skull when Max used his shooting hand to brace the back of his head.

Gunshots in his ears like explosions when Max turned to fire one-handed into the darkness behind him. His own pitiful shrieks, muffled into Max’s shoulder: ‘Mommy! Mommy, I’m scared!’

Max’s wrist would hurt later, from all the one-handed shooting. He would’ve had two hands if he didn’t have to carry him. And if he’d had two hands, he’d have made sure Jess didn’t have that peeling gash in her arm.

Six years old. And already Ash’s world was unbearably, unnaturally cold.

Cold, and metal, and no amount of lemons and sweaters would make it warm and soft. No amount of clutching at Jess’ leg and trying to wipe the drool off Max’s neck would stop making it his fault.

Scared, scared, so petrified. Eyes wide, peeking through a mess of electric wire and piping. Fingers clammy where they held a tear gas canister. It smelled like engine oil.

Max’s rambling outside the hangar door— “Just a routine check, can’t risk any of these babies giving engine trouble after blast-off; bosses will take my head off; this guy knows what I’m talking ‘bout, right?”—sugar drizzled over the lie to make it easier to swallow. Jess’ long ponytail brushing over top of his head as he hid behind her, just like she told him to. His baby brother’s life all too fragile against his palm where it rested on Jess’ swollen belly.

“He’s kicking a lot today,” she said to Ash, her smile bright and quaking.  “I think he’s trying to tell us something.”

“What’s he saying?” Ash whispered back. It was the first risk he ever took, all on his own.

“That everything’s going to be okay, Aslan.” Her shotgun was still trained on the door, even though the clip-clop of the security guards’ weighted shoes was receding. “You hear? We’re all going to be just fine.”

Ash nodded. But the bulk of the emergency handgun tucked into her waistband cut into him where he hugged her, and he did not believe it.

They would pick the baby’s name later, when they were all safe in the spacecraft they’d stolen. Something ageless, something sacred and strong, Max and Jess would decide. Something made of light and goodness, they would agree.

Something like ‘Aslan’, a name for his brother just like his own, they would tell Ash.

“How about Michael?”

“Michael. Mikey for short. I like it.”

Ten years old. And already Ash was picking out a nickname for himself, preparing to trade ‘Mom’ and ‘Dad’ in for ‘Max’ and ‘Jess’.

Because Aslan was not like his brother; he was all troublemaker and no angel.

He was not like his family; he was all apocalypse and no miracle, one that needed no horsemen and no summoning to wreak havoc.

“Aslan’s too last century for me. I wanna go by Ash. Just Ash is okay.”

No amount of head pats from Max and we’re-so-proud-of-yous from Jess were ever going to stop making this constant fighting and sneaking and running and dodging his stupid fault.

Sick, sick, bloody nauseated. Muscles protesting his sprinting despite the low gravity. Red and purple blooming under his knuckles, a tattered comms device crushed in his fist. He smelled like sweat.

The man’s taunts still stuck to his skin— “Touchy, touchy. Watch your mouth, kid, or it’ll be your family’s brains smeared on the ground too, just the same as yours”—sleaze congealed to them. The crack of the man’s nose as he’d hit him fresh in his mind, the blood from his split lip smudged on his jeans.

Everyone was sitting at the dinner table when Ash threw the door to their unit open. “Okay. We have to fucking go!”

“Language! Michael’s right here.”

“Oh, gimme a break, Jess, he’s four!”

                “And you’re not that much older, take that damn bass out of your voice, Ash.”

“Ughhhhh. Fine. But like actually, we have to go.”

“Why?”

“They’ve got a warrant out for your arrest.”

“…’Kay, what else is new?”

“Not the harmless kind, Max, like the shoot-on-sight kind!”

“You gotta be kidding me, here too?”

               “Well, we did know Golzine was expanding his payroll. Looks like they’ve already got their claws in here.”

“Oh, that they have.”

               “What’s that supposed to mean, kiddo?”

“…I may have run into one of them. He tracked my U-watch somehow, I’m sure of it.”

“And? What happened?”

“…”

“Ash.”        

“Punched ‘m.”

“You did what?”

“Punched him in the face and ripped out his fucking communicator to buy us some time, Max.”

                “Aslan Jade!”

“What’re you government-naming me for; fucker grabbed my ass and got in my face; what was I supposed to do?!”

“Honestly…”

               “What’re you making that face for Jess, he’s your son—”

“—Shut up, Max, he’s your son too, reckless brat that he is…Now go get your shit together; Ash is right, we have to fucking go.”

               “Language, Jess.”

They would make it out with no injuries this time, but it would take twice as long for Max to come and take his point-and-shoot emergency gun away from Ash.

Fourteen years old. And already shooting for long enough that Max trusted him with a weapon.

Because he knew Ash would never, ever fire it at someone. Not unless there was absolutely no other choice. Not unless it was either the other person or him. Which was how it was supposed to be. Ash knew he didn’t mean much, not on his own, but he would not accept death and abandon the people he loved, not when his mind and his weapons training and his self-defence skills were so useful.

Because this was all Ash was good for, he knew. Guns and lies and surviving.

And no amount of encouraging grins from Jess over physics textbooks, awed admiration from Max over his cobbled-together inventions, or starry-eyed ‘woahs’ from Mikey were ever, ever, going to stop making this haze of grief and violence hanging over their lives his fucking fault.

Just like now.

Exhausted, livid, fucking worried out of his mind. A Wolfsbane sky above him, sour and pale like cheap lemonade, just a couple of hours shy of sunset. Nettles and moss below him, dying under his feet as he jumped off the bicycle, buried into the hungry earth as he stood his ground before the power plant gates. He still smelled like his birthday.

Ocean. Fresh blankets. Roses.

Ash could hear the whirring as the electronic lock on the gates disengaged and they slid open for him, not a soul in sight but conceivably enough in the shadows to note that he had arrived. He could feel the edges of the USB drive tucked inside his jacket pocket clawing out the softness in his chest, almost as much as he could feel the absence of a gun salting the bloody mess left behind.

Seventeen years old. And this too, was all his fault.

Really, Ash should be used to this by now. He’d had a whole lifetime to get used to it. But as hellish as everything had seemed before, it was nothing compared to the singular torment of this moment.

Because Max and Jess had accepted his danger from moment one, purposefully dragged the consequences of him living to see another day into their own lives. And Mikey couldn’t help it, poor thing had been born into Ash’s danger; a hunted creature for an older brother had been forced upon him.

But Eiji?

He hadn’t even known.

He’d put flowers in Ash’s hair and shown Ash his paintings and tied their souls in a Gordian Knot like he’d wanted nothing more—

And he hadn’t even fucking known.

Arthur and the sentient extensions of his vicious will had barged into his home and taken him away and done God knows what to him by this point, and Eiji hadn’t even known why.

Or…maybe he did. Now.

Maybe they told Eiji. Everything. All about how Ash couldn’t stay in one place without spilling blood, just by existing.

 Ash didn’t know who would tell him, not Jess surely, not without his permission, but Arthur, depending on how much he knew…

Fuck, Ash had always felt the weight of guilt, known the sight of numb despair in his own eyes. But he hadn’t truly tasted shame until today.

Stomach acid burning the back of his throat, something like hard candy stuck there so fast it made breathing laborious. Something that wouldn’t dissolve, not like the taffy and tease in Eiji’s voice when he booped Ash’s nose and said—

Liar.

Ash reeled as the memory of jokes warped into accusations, ice and stone where once there had been sherbet and clouds. He deserved it, he knew he did, but—

But Eiji’s voice didn’t sound like his own in the version Ash’s mind distorted it into to punish himself.

So, hope prevailed, even now.

He shook himself and began to walk forward, keeping an eye out for hostiles as he crossed the threshold of the power plant compound. The cooling towers loomed over him, puffing out smoke and judgement like ruthless gods. The hazard signs bored into him, and the buzz of the electric fence made all the hairs stand up on the back of his neck. But he didn’t let any of that deter him.

Because Ash may have been a coward in all the ways it mattered, but he would not be cowed by grandstanding and bluster, by something so inconsequential as the possibility of his own death. He would not be leashed or jerked around like a puppet. He would not be fucked with like this; and he certainly would not suffer his own to be fucked with like this.

And really, Arthur should’ve known that, should’ve thought it through before trying to back someone like Ash into a corner.

Oh, well. Nothing to be done for it now.

If Arthur wanted a fight, then he would get a fucking war.

And from what Ash knew, wars were won by tacticians, not brutes.

Hence, no gun. Not yet anyway. But no gun didn’t mean no plan.

“I know you’re here, Arthur!” Ash said, loud enough for his words to ricochet round the empty compound. “Show yourself.”

Nothing moved for a few moments; not a peep from the ancillary buildings, sitting heavy and silent like grey bricks in Ash’s periphery. Then suddenly the door to the reactor containment building before him was clanging open, and Ash dug his heels into the ground, adamant not to flinch.

Not even when Arthur sauntered out, hands in his pockets, smug, sneering, cyanide dripping from every word.

“Hey, Lynx. Why’d you come? You know it’s a trap, right?”

Ash scowled. He didn’t have the patience for this, to look upon Arthur’s smarmy grin and keep himself from knocking his teeth out, one miserable tooth at a time. “I knew I’d have to settle this with you some day. Now where the fuck is Eiji? Where’s my family?”

Arthur shrugged, like this question did not need to be answered. He waved an idle hand and Ash’s skin prickled as a litany of clicks sliced through the air, a sound only a host of gun-safeties being released all at once could make. “Hate to break it to you, but it’s not just about us anymore.”

The clatter of boots struck Ash’s ears in dissonant rhythm, and he watched warily as gunmen emerged from the semi-circle of structures around him. Sixty narrowed eyes sized him up as they fanned out, and thirty gun-barrels stared him down.

Yeesh. This was certainly more firepower than Ash knew Arthur to have.

And there was only one person that could upgrade him this much.

It seemed Ash’s hunch had been right after all; fourteen long years of running had caught up to him. Golzine had found him.

Huh, how strange. He could not muster his fear.

Not from the spacecraft hangar, nor the darkened corridors before that; not from the solitary memory he had of Griffin, in which he’d put Ash’s hand in Max’s and told him to never let go.

No, all he had now was a fizzing anger, a set jaw, and an oncoming headache.

“So, that’s what’s going on,” Ash said, glaring at the two gunmen who split off from the pack to frisk him. He stood still as he was patted down, even though the nose of one gun was jammed pointedly into his side. “This is low even for you, being tamed like some sort of attack dog.”

“He’s clean,” the gunman checking him for weapons muttered, and Arthur’s smile glinted like a knife-shard upon his face.

“You’re talking an awfully big game for an unarmed son of a bitch,” he said, charging at Ash as the two gunmen circling him rejoined the group. Ash kept his expression carefully neutral as Arthur grabbed him by the front of his t-shirt.

“I’d keep my mouth shut if I were you. One word and these fuckers will send the kid and your pansy boyfriend straight to hell. See if your mommy gives a damn whether you live or die then.”

Ash scoffed; with Arthur this close to his face, he could see the mottled mark on his cheek perfectly clear.

“Attagirl, Jess; she punched you in the face, didn’t she?”

Arthur swung at him then, and Ash cringed as he stumbled backwards from the force of the blow. He couldn’t find it in himself to be sorry though, not even when two others came up and pinned his hands behind his back.

“Get him inside,” Arthur ordered, flexing his fingers. Ash eyed the stitches on them as he was walked forward, past Arthur and into the reactor containment building.

Martyrs, those panthers. Ash would never forget them.

He licked off the trickle of blood from his nose that had found its way to his mouth as he stepped into the building, pushed halfway into the doorframe by the men holding him. From what Ash could tell, his nose wasn’t broken, but Arthur had certainly hit him hard enough to break skin. It should have hurt, but the sensation was nothing but dull throbbing and a mild itch when he was concentrating like this.

Loathe as Ash was to admit it, there was no better place to do this than inside the reactor building. It was the last place for gunshots and tussling, the last place to try to fight his way out of, especially not when a good third of the gunmen from outside had followed them in and were watching him like hawks.

No doubt Arthur had been given free reign over these people; no doubt he’d chosen this place for negotiations to limit Ash’s options.

Bold of him to think that Ash wasn’t rash and angry enough to attempt something anyway, of course, but Ash kept that thought to himself.

He took in the reinforced concrete walls as he was led through the lower level, vibrations beneath his feet as the active reactor core hummed, fissions of incredible magnitude not nearly far enough from him to keep his frayed nerves from sparking. The halogen lights above them were harsh and white, though a faint blue glow rose up from the lights illuminating the reactor core below them. Ash’s eyes screwed shut as he was hassled up the rickety stairs to the first-floor deck, and when he opened them again, he found himself on the landing overlooking the reactor core. Before him were two men and a table, and all three looked dreadfully out of place.

These men weren’t in mismatched F4A hand-me-downs like Arthur was, neither were they in the crisp uniforms of the gunmen who’d followed them into this stand-off. No, they were in three-piece suits that hugged them perfectly, and they carried special-issue handguns that were far too advanced to have been manufactured on Earth. Add to that their undertaker posture and the disdainful way in which they regarded Arthur, and it was all Ash needed to figure out just which master these two served.

These were Golzine’s men.

Part of his inner circle, and well-trusted too, if the near-priceless holo-projecting interface device sitting on the table between them was any indication. One of them produced a remote from somewhere while Arthur dealt Ash a kick in the back of his legs, and he went down on his knees as the holo-projector flickered to life.

“Well, well, well. Haven’t you grown, little kitten.”

That voice. Like crude oil and frog venom; spoiled milk and pus.

Ash had never tried to imagine Golzine; evil didn’t need an earthly form to be terrifying. But even if he had, he’d never have been able to conjure up anything as vile as what was before him now.

So noxious, so filthy, like the monster under the bed that Ash hoped would never find him under his blanket.

Only Ash didn’t have his blanket now.

No mom and dad to come running and reassure him that it was nothing but a bad dream. No big brother to sleep by his side to protect him. No light, no warmth, no ducky pyjamas—

No Max, no Jess, no Griff, no—

No Eiji.

Just him and a cosmic horror in a nest of enemies that held within it enough power to level the entire settlement if he stepped one centimetre out of line.

Oh, shit. Oh, God. There it was. That fear.

“Arthur tells me they call you Lynx now. I wonder if you would make a good pet.”

Ash couldn’t look up. He didn’t want to see this man’s face. But Arthur yanked him upright by the hair, then held him in place.

God, Golzine looked like an ancient crocodile.

Too wide a mouth, too many teeth, reptilian edge in his eyes as they roved over Ash, practically picking the flesh off his bones like he was some sort of succulent side dish. Ash recoiled when he licked his lips, catching the edge of his moustache, which sat above his lips like the pelt of a dead white mouse.

“Ah, yes. I’m glad I changed my mind. You’d be wasted as a corpse. Though I think, you’d make an excellent doll if we found the right taxidermist.”

Golzine breathed heavily as he sank back into a plush red chair, and from the way his bald head hit the cushion, Ash could tell he was up in space. Some colony with nice forgiving gravity, though which one it was Ash could not pinpoint with so tight a focus on Golzine’s face.

He struggled against the men restraining him. Ash didn’t know why he was doing it; there was no running away for him, not now, not with Mikey, Jess, and Eiji on the line, but it was reflexive.

He couldn’t stand Golzine’s eyes on him, couldn’t bear to hear his voice without shaking the way he was now. He didn’t want to be on his knees in front of him, didn’t want Arthur tearing at his hair and laughing.

He wanted to leave, he wanted to hide, he wanted his bedroom and cloud-themed sheets and Eiji’s voice.

My light in the dark, Aslan.

Ash wrenched himself out of Arthur’s grip because it was the only thing he could stop right then, and tears welled in his eyes as a few strands of hair came away in Arthur’s hand. He didn’t cry though, not even when Arthur slapped him, hard enough to bruise.

“Watch it,” Golzine said, terse and frowning as Arthur raised his hand to hit Ash again. “I don’t believe I gave you permission to break him.” His eyes went to Ash’s bleeding nose, then back to Arthur, stonier than before. “You’ve ruined him enough as it is.”

Arthur’s fists clenched, but it appeared he knew better than to talk back, because he dropped his hand immediately. “Enough small talk,” he huffed. “Time for business.”

“Yes.” Golzine reached towards something out of frame, and when his hand returned, it held a half-filled champagne flute. Then his poisoned-slime-on-a-thumbtack stare zeroed in on Ash.

“Do you have it, boy? The information on BANANA FISH?”

It was a Herculean task for Ash to reply. He felt like talking to Golzine would make him real, would dispense with all hope of this being just some twisted hallucination. But keeping his mouth shut was no longer an option.

He could delay this no longer. This was all the time he could buy.

“Yes.”

“All of it?” Arthur asked, crouching before him, low and threatening as he casually retrieved a knife from his jacket.

Ash watched the light dance upon it as Arthur twirled it, just waiting for Ash to give him a reason to use it. “All of it,” he confirmed.

Golzine’s smile wrinkled his face in the same way a hot poker would wrinkle a plastic tarp. “Splendid.”

“Told you I’d get him to come around,” Arthur crowed, stunting before the old man like he’d conquered half the galaxy.

But when Golzine’s gaze flitted to Arthur, he seemed most unimpressed. “You can pat yourself on the back when both the boy and the BANANA FISH research are splayed out on my table in Elysium.”

Huh. So that’s where he was. Noted.

“I haven’t sent you the plane to play cops and robbers with. Have them both on it and space bound within the hour. And I’d better see the Glenreeds’ blood on them too.”

Arthur went rigid then, and Ash noticed his fingers tighten around the hilt of his knife with some unease. “You don’t actually expect me to hand him off to you alive? He got me mauled half to death!”

“Your petty vendetta is trivial to me,” Golzine said, waving his champagne flute dismissively. “Need I remind you that you’ll get nothing from me if my packages are lost in transit or show up damaged in any way. I hired you to kill the journalists and erase all evidence of the BANANA FISH project from Wolfsbane, not cut my meat for me. So, deliver Ash Lynx alive and my project along with it, or it’ll be you on the wrong end of all those guns that I put in your hands.”

Ash squirmed, feeling for all the world like the prize cut in a butcher’s shop, even as Arthur gulped like an inflamed fish. Ash saw him shiver, and knew then that Arthur was feeling all the hollow steel eyes trained on Ash’s back now trained on his too.

“Do you want to kill him yourself? Is that it?” Arthur asked in a tone that would’ve been enough for Ash to order the hit if he’d been on the other side of that holo-projection.

“This is the problem with you settlement kids,” Golzine tutted. “No vision, not even an idle thought for the future.” He raised his glass to Ash, and Ash felt wood chips digging into his lungs as he went on.

“You don’t leave a body like that unravaged. You discard a mind like that even less. Before he was only Griffin Callenreese’s pesky little vestige, an insect I didn’t care to let bite me. But many years have passed since then, haven’t they, Ash? You’re much more now, aren’t you?”

Ash did no more than spit at the holo-projection. He wasn’t going to dignify any of that with a response.

Golzine however, seemed amused, and set down his glass. “How vulgar. I shall enjoy remaking you.”

He cast one last look at Arthur, so scornful it could melt bones. “Now, then. Hop to it. You have your orders. Don’t disappoint me again.”

And with that the holo-projection winked off, leaving Arthur with his teeth grinding and Ash on the floor with fire-ants and water-snakes under his skin.

Arthur’s form deflated for a second, unsure, then Ash watched it pull taut once more. The knife was unsteady in his grip, but Ash knew better than to disregard that. So, when Arthur’s beady little eyes met his, full of lighter fluid and hate, Ash’s mind was already made up.

“Bastard.”

Arthur didn’t say much more before lunging at him, knife aimed as his throat. But Ash was faster, quicker to use the slack-jawed surprise of the men holding him against them. He headbutted one, then pushed the other off him when his grip loosened. By the time Arthur had crossed the three feet between them, Ash had gotten his bearings enough to somersault out of stabbing range.

The momentum of Arthur’s approach sent him sprawling on the floor, and Ash took advantage of the disarray to vault upon the table. He kicked the holo-projecting device into some unknown crevice, even as the gunmen around him stayed frozen to their spots, aims taken but reluctant to shoot.

Ash had been counting on this; counting on the fact that the last order that Golzine had barked out was that Ash be brought to him alive.

Though he didn’t count on it to stay everyone’s hand. The two high-ranking operatives he’d expected to see a reaction from pulled their guns from their holsters. But Ash levelled kicks at both of their heads from up on the table, sending one of them flying as his foot caught the man in the eye. The other man managed to dodge his attack, even succeeded in pulling the trigger before Ash boxed him in the throat, but the bullet only grazed his bicep and the man crumpled to the floor, so he took it as a win.

Not that there was time to celebrate any of that, not with Arthur already making his way towards him, knife ready once more. But before his stagger could build into a run, Ash leapt off the table and dashed straight for the edge of the deck. He plucked the precious USB drive from his jacket and held it out over the hundred-foot drop into the reactor core, straight above the irradiated cooling water.

“Back the fuck up, all of you,” Ash growled. “One more step and BANANA FISH will be swimming with the rest of biohazards down there.”

That got Arthur to skid to a stop, though the vein on his forehead bulged like a crab leg. He put out a hand behind him to keep the rest of the gunmen from moving. “Hand it over, Ash.”

“Gladly. The second you let Eiji and my family go, I’ll hand it over. I’m not fucking moving till you let them go.”

“Oh, I’ll let them go, alright!” Arthur bellowed, then let out a shrill whistle. Ash didn’t want to look away, but he couldn’t help himself when Wookie’s head popped out from over the third-floor landing deck.

“Get the hostages,” Arthur told him, shark-gleam in his eyes. “It’s about time to make them scream.”

Wookie shouted down a ‘Yes, boss!’ then disappeared, and Ash’s heart promptly jumped into his throat.

Any second. Any second now; he just had to stall for a little while longer.

“You want to drop the USB, Ash? Go ahead and drop it,” Arthur smirked. “But then I’ll drop the hostages too, clean off the edge of that deck up there. First your mother, then the kid, then goody-two-shoes Okumura piece by bloody piece. And you won’t be able to do a damn thing but watch. You got two more minutes to act like a tough guy, then for every minute it takes you to hand the thing over, I’ll tell my boys to hack a chunk off those three and send it over the edge. And what the fuck will you do about it? I own this room, and you got nothing, and no one.”

And that? That was the point where the filaments of frost that cobbled together the logic circuits in Ash’s mind snapped like dead twigs.

He laughed; the sound feral even to his own ears.

Who the fuck did Arthur think he was trying to scare?

Ash knew this place well, this fraying tightrope over a vast vortex with five hundred fangs. He knew terror, and the vividity of the worst-case scenario; he knew the potency of nightmares and the atrocity that a guilt-ridden mind could conjure up.

Did Arthur think he did not see that shit already, in his darkest moments? Did he think Ash did not wonder if one day he would wake up to find his whole family dead at his feet just for daring to care for him? Did Arthur fucking think, even for one deranged second, that Ash had stopped seeing Eiji’s blood on his hands from the moment he’d known Eiji had been taken?

Really, who did this rodent think he was trying to scare?

Not Ash. Not in the middle of his fucking war.

Because he was not in fact an unarmed son of a bitch, and neither was he alone. And Arthur would see it too, in three…two…

“Boss!”

Ash felt something settle over his shoulders, the helter-skeltering adrenaline in him finally finding a course. It felt like bronze, steel, fucking titanium.

Armour.

He looked up when Arthur did and felt the rush of blood abate in his veins when he caught sight of Wookie’s petrified face over top of the railing.

“Boss! It’s—it’s the hostages! They’re gone!”

Oh, the look on Arthur’s face. If Ash didn’t know any better, he’d think the man was eroding before his eyes, flaking like rust, sagging like sodden paper.

“Come again?! I thought I told you imbeciles to watch them!”

“We were, it’s just—”

A resounding clang engulfed the rest of his words, and Wookie’s body toppled forward and tumbled to the ground as blood gushed around his ears. Outside, tires screeched, metal gnashed like leviathan teeth, and Arthur glared at Ash with a burgeoning rage in his eyes.

Ash, for his own part, allowed himself a smile. “You were saying?”

Then there was a clink and a hiss of smoke as something dropped between Arthur and Ash from above. Arthur swore when he recognized the canister for a smoke bomb and started towards the opaque orange fog building between them.

His knife arced through the air in a frenzy, but it met no flesh or bone, only air. Because by the time he reached the edge of the deck, Ash was already gone.

---

Four hours earlier…

“How’re we looking, Alex?”

“Uh, let’s see: the ground crew was able to pull together two pushback trucks, one power unit and a refueler.”

“And the loader with the power-hose for Bones?”

“Secured, Boss.”

“…Do you have to call me that?”

“Do you prefer General? Captain? Your Royal Highness?”

“The fuck is wrong with ‘Ash’?”

            “‘Ash’ isn’t a battle-strategy encyclopaedia. ‘Lynx’ is just some rigger. ‘Boss’ sounds about right to me.”

“Fuck you, Sing; don’t encourage them.”

“Ay, a little respect; I’m sticking out my neck for you just the same as everyone else here.”

“I didn’t fucking ask you to! In fact, I specifically said, ‘Butt out!’”

“Pff, who do you think you are, telling me what to do?”

“Sing, you are fourteen—”

“And what, asshole? You’re my friend and so is Eiji; also, if you think I’m passing up the chance to fuck Arthur up—”

“This isn’t about Arthur; Eiji and my family might die; take this shit seriously, Sing—”

“I am serious, you’re just—”

“Boys. Is this really the most valuable use of our time?”

“No, Nadia.”   “No, Nadia.”

“Yeah, didn’t think so. Now, Ash; walk us through it, slowly. What’s your plan?”

“Okay. So, I’m thinking I go in alone with the BANANA FISH research, make first contact—”

“The fuck you will!”

“Max, don’t start.”

“No, Ash. I’m not losing you too; I mean it. I’ll make contact with Arthur.”

“He didn’t leave the note for you; he left it for me. He wants me to come there with the research, not you. God only knows what the bastard will do if we don’t follow his instructions to the letter.”

“But—”

“No, Max. You know this is the right move as well as I do. Just…I’ve got this, okay? Can you trust me?”

“…Yeah. Yeah, okay, fine. God, I hope when Griff kills me all over again in the afterlife, he makes it quick.”

“Cry about it on your own time, drama queen; no rest for the wicked. Anyway, now that that’s out of the way, let’s focus on the front of the compound. I’m thinking I’ll use this path through the Woodlands here and come out by this gate. Alex, you’re gonna have to find a way to keep an eye on the whole thing. I can’t go in with comms, so you’re the control tower for everyone else. If we can’t keep time, we’re screwed.”

“I could set up shop in this clearing here, Boss. And that tree should keep any surveillance cams hidden. How do you feel about a tracker in your pocket?”

“No good, they’ll frisk me. Here, put it in the sole of my shoe. With any luck, they won’t go in there.”

“On it. I’m assuming you won’t bring the gun with you either, then?”

“No. Max will hold onto it for me.”

            “You do know how to shoot that thing, don’t you, Ash? You’re not old enough to be licenced and your Mecha clearance doesn’t—”

“He’s fine, Charlie; I taught him how to defend himself the second he was old enough to fire without dislocating his wrists. Plus, we practiced with this one a bit when Cain gave it to him.”

“Sheesh, Max. They could’ve gotten him on unlawful possession—”

“Hey, don’t lecture me about my son while you and half your department are actively going rogue, Detective Dickhead—

“Are you two done?”

“Yes, Nadia.” “Yes, Nadia.”

“Good. Continue, Ash.”

“Thank you. As I was saying, I’ll go in first; keep Arthur and half the force distracted in the front of the building. Meanwhile, Sing will engage the B team assigned to guard the hostages and clear a path for Max. Bones, Kong, do we know where they’re being held?”

“Somewhere in the containment building from what I can tell, Boss. The other security details for the compound are using comms in the 300-megahertz range but the eastern side? They’ve got that 900-megahertz fancy-ass-goes-through-walls shit.”

“Yeah, we think they’re holding everyone somewhere on the third or fourth floor. We compared our scans to Max’s maps; we’re pretty sure they’ve got staff rooms and storage up there. Perfect for keeping hostages locked up.”

“Good work, you two. You sure you weren’t seen?”

“No, Boss. We stayed behind the forest edge like you said.”

“You got all that from behind the forest edge?”

“We’re Mecha, Charlie. We find a way.”

“Damn.”

“Okay, eastern side it is then. Sing, who do you want for your strategy?”

“I’ll take Kong. Bones drives too reckless, and we don’t want to make too much of a ruckus with the power unit.”

            “Hey!”

“Oh, who’re you kidding, you know you want to drive the pushback.”

            “…yeah, okay.”

“Great. We’re settled then. Sing and Kong divert the B team security detail after they take me to wherever negotiations are. Max sneaks in while they’re busy and breaks Jess, Mikey, and Eiji out. The moment, and I mean the moment they’re free, Bones and Charlie bring the cavalry.”

“Right. I use this pushback to bring the refueler into position here. Couple of Molotov cocktails, and the front lawn goes up in flames, along with all its inhabitants.”

                        “And I get to use Revvina—

“Who?”

“—The other pushback, Charlie; keep up—”

“Oh, excuse me—”

“—to bring the police contingent to the southern side to engage any of Golzine’s remaining people so that they can go bye-bye too.”

“More than that, Bones. I want that spaceplane they have parked there in fucking shambles.”

“All due respect, Ash; they’ve got handguns, and Bones can’t shoot to save his life.”

                         “Who’re you calling a little bitch, Charlie; Revvina’s got a loader with a power-hose mounted on it that’s capable of firing a fuckton of anti-icing fluid. Your boys are the opening act to my motherfucking showstopper.”

“I didn’t call you a little bitch. And what in the name of hell is anti-icing fluid?”

“Propylene glycol and water, cooking at 150 ℉. Obviously.”

“Obviously? We don’t even have ice here, Bones; where’d you even find that?”

“Like we said, Charlie. We’re Mecha.”

“You find a way. I got that. Still waiting for how its gonna take down a spaceplane.”

“It’s highly pressurized, old man, so it’s perfect for holding off multiple shooters while the cops take bullets to the fuel tanks. And if all else fails, it’ll create enough chaos to cover my ass long enough to slice through some wires. I’m no rigger, but I know what to cut through to make a plane go boom in the stratosphere.”

                         “I don’t know; Ash, do you think that’ll work?”

“We gotta make it work, Max. If we can’t engage them on all fronts, they’ll overwhelm us.”

“Yeah okay, but what about you? Even if the outer forces are all kept busy, you’ll still surrounded by hostiles when everything starts to hit the fan. What’s to stop Arthur from just shooting you and taking the research?”

“He won’t risk it. Didn’t you hear what Yue Lung said? Golzine wants me alive, and without him Arthur will never be anything more than some settlement punk. If Golzine orders him to stand down, he can’t ignore it. It’s all the leverage I have.”

“It’s on some shaky grounds, is all I’m saying.”

“It’s on wafer-thin ice; what’s your fucking point, Max? High risk, high reward, right?”

“…Right. You’re right; ignore me I’m just—I’m just worried.”

                         “What about me and Shunichi, Ash? Where do you want us?”

“You’ll be right here at Chang Dai, Nadia, ready for any injured. With any luck we won’t need a hospital. And Shunichi, you’ll be our getaway driver.”

“Okay. Yes, I can do that. But where can I wait? Do you know which gates you will come out of?”

“No. That’s where it gets tricky. You’ll circle the compound while everything goes down, just to cover all our bases, but we’ll just have to rely on comms in the moment to find each other.”

“Oh, great. Looks like we’re all relying on Glenreed Luck tonight.”

“Knowing Max’s track record, it’s better than devil’s, Shunichi. Now come on, let’s get moving. We’ve wasted enough time.”

---

The smoke grenade was a Vitae legacy.

Another one of their secrets, like their fireworks and flares, against the laws of the settlement but preserved for the community just in case. Only for ocean travel emergencies, only if there was risk to life and limb. Sing had said there would be a stash at Eiji’s apartment, if the rumours about them only being entrusted to the most decorated of graduates were true.

And so there were, right there in a neat, labelled box in one of Eiji’s cabinets.

Ash had almost laughed when he’d found them. As illegal as they were, and Eiji hadn’t even been trying to hide them.  

Not that it surprised him. It was exactly the kind of defiance that became Eiji.

Ash had grabbed three, because there were only nine in the box, and he’d taken enough from Eiji already. When he’d handed them off to Max, he’d said, “Set them off where the negotiations are happening when the time is right. I’ll need a literal smokescreen if I’m going to get away from Arthur without a weapon.”

Far be it for Max to stop at a smokescreen, though. No, what he’d decided to create was a maelstrom.

Ash heard the pop and hiss of the other two canisters somewhere above him right after the one between him and Arthur began to smoke, and he couldn’t think why Max had deployed them so prematurely. Those were supposed to be a ‘Hail Mary’, not spare rounds.

Nevertheless, he didn’t question it, not when Arthur was dashing towards him like a mad man, his knife at the ready. It was all Ash could do to wrap his wrist firmly in the nylon rope that had dropped down with the canister and give it two sharp tugs.

He was pulled up and off the first-floor deck just seconds before Arthur ripped through the air where he’d been standing.

Ash heard Arthur braying in dismay like a wounded donkey, but his voice was already fading, and with every inch of distance between them, the coil of stress in Ash’s chest started to slacken. He inhaled deeply.

Glenreed Luck, indeed.

He tipped his face up, towards the railing of the third-floor deck and usable oxygen. Max was peering down at him, sweaty and red with exertion but sunny with relief, with hope.

Ash couldn’t help but grin back. It was working.

The orange smoke swirled below him, choking and blinding Arthur and the gunmen. All around him there was a growing crescendo of disoriented shouts, stray gunshots ringing in the space as bullets bounced off railings and panels. Before, the loudest thing in the room had been the reactor, ominous and rumbling like some slumbering beast. But now it was being dwarfed by the whooshes and blasts from outside the building.

Unbelievable. The most audacious thing Ash had ever put his mind to, so desperate and angry and clawing for vengeance, and it was actually working.

High risk, high reward, kiddo. That’s the name of the game.

If he closed his eyes, and let the sounds take over, Ash could imagine Bones systematically decapitating that spaceplane with every clank of metal and rush of liquid he heard. And Charlie he was sure was already making quick work of the forward detail, if the roar of fire and frenzied scattering of footsteps was any indication. So far so good, but Ash’s heart still thundered, and he knew it would not calm till he was positive that Sing and Kong had gotten away unscathed as well, till he re-established contact with Alex, till he knew for sure that—

Max held out his arm and Ash reached for it, only slightly apologetic as his nails dug into Max’s forearm. Max heaved and grunted as he hauled Ash over the railing of the third-floor deck, first one-handed, then two when he was sure enough of his grip to abandon the rope entirely. Ash landed on his side in an ungainly heap, drawing in lungfuls of air as Max kneeled next to him to pat his back when he coughed. The smoke wasn’t quite so thick around him here, but there was still a haze, one that made the light from the ceiling dance strangely as Ash wobbled to his feet.

“Kiddo? Hey kiddo, you okay?”

Max’s voice came to him as water through soil, somehow all around yet not close enough. He blinked at his knees, then up at Max’s face. The ridges in it rounded by a heartening smile; the grey veil in his eyes giving way to brazen blue again, kindling waiting to catch.

And for the first time since he was ten years old, Ash said, “Yeah. I’m okay. Thanks, dad.”

Max gaped at him as though his entire life was in Ash’s eyes. His eyes hovered on Ash’s bloody nose for a second, and then the moment was lost, shattered by two gunshots from somewhere behind Max’s back.

Ash nearly screamed, but Max’s hand was steady on his shoulder; he had not been hurt. They both twisted around to see what had happened, and that was when Ash caught sight of Jessica, her fingers closed firmly around a smoking gun even as one of Golzine’s men dropped to the ground like a sack of potatoes.

The man had a colony-issue gun out; another minute and he’d have taken Max’s head clean off.

Stupid of him really, to think Max was unprotected.

Because blood may have been dripping from Jess’ mouth, and her hair may have been falling like charred wheat around the bruises on her neck, but she looked just as she had the day Ash had first seen her: weapon in hand, eyes proud and determined, like a diamond drill bit wrapped in silk.

Watching Max’s back like a hawk.

“Really now, what would you boys do without me?” she smirked, with her affectionate snark, her caustic love.

“Die, apparently.” Max laughed, because he’d been weak to it for decades now, but Ash couldn’t do much more than swallow his own whimpers, because he was already looking past her.

Past her, at the two figures waiting in the shadow of a pillar for her go-ahead.

A small face, tear-blotched yet determined, eyes hidden behind a curtain of tousled blonde as chattering teeth nibbled into an over-nibbled thumbnail.

Michael.

And beside him, a face so soft and wary, like an elder bloom at the end of spring, its anxious pallor stark against ink-drop eyes, resolve stubborn in them like pinpricks of moonlight.

Eiji.

Dried blood matting the bangs on the left side of his head, wrists lashed with purple, yet ducky pyjamas still intact.

Eiji…

Holding Michael to his chest, shielding his head, eyes now intent on Ash, reverence and reprimand and rapture all at once.

Eiji.

Ash waited for the fear, for the shame and the guilt, but nothing came to him except a bone-deep release, his agony bursting like a dam as he rushed towards them all. Flood in his limbs, drought in his lungs; he couldn’t breathe until he’d gathered all three of them close to his chest, pressed them to his heartbeat so they’d know just how glad he was to see them again.

He dipped his head so Jess could muss his hair and kiss his forehead; rocked Michael in his arms and pinched his cheek and told him how brave he was. But once he’d safely handed Michael to Max and turned to Eiji, Ash’s movements stuttered, unsure of how to touch him, what to say.

Do I deserve you? After what I’ve done, do you want me still?

And then suddenly there were palms on his face—Eiji’s palms—so warm, so starved, so fucking indulgent, that for a moment Ash was back in Eiji’s bed, wrapped in the same blanket, rose petals crumbling into the pillow, as Eiji kissed him, again and again and again.

I do want you. There.

“Honey,” Eiji said, smiling at last, sweet like wine and raspberries and everything that fate liked to crush into forever.

Oh, Ash couldn’t keep it in any longer, but the truth found no path of least resistance to escape. It was all bad, all heinous to admit, and his tongue was clumsy in his mouth, but words still tumbled, no meaning to them, no order or reason, only urgency, only need.

“I—Eiji—Eiji, I—you know that—Eiji, I never meant—it was only supposed to—Eiji, Eiji—Fuck, why can’t—I only wanted—Eiji—”

“Shh.” Eiji brushed his nose against his; kissed comfort into Ash’s trembling lips with patience that was only his, softness that was only his. “Later. You are safe, and we are together, so we will worry about explanations in the morning, yes?”

“Yes. Yes, anything. Whatever you want; just please—please—”

Ash didn’t even know how to ask for what he wanted as he grasped Eiji’s t-shirt for purchase; he didn’t know with what right he could demand that Eiji hold him now, accept him now as he was fully, see him for a wretch and a liar and a coward and still take him into his arms, now.

Now.

Especially because now, they were still in the middle of the power plant. Now, a dead man was lying not two feet from them, and Max and Jess were stripping him of his personal arsenal.

Now, an alarm began to blare as the white lights conked off and a red glow took their place. A magnified hum came from somewhere deep in the facility, and Ash stifled a howl as Eiji’s thumbs quit mapping out the ridge of his cheekbones. Eiji dropped his hands, and Ash signalled wordlessly to Max with an inferno in the pit of his stomach.

There was no time. They had to go. Now.

Max nodded, understanding, and put Michael down. “Mikey,” he said, “stick with Eiji and stay quiet, okay?”

Michael gave no answer, only a serious little chin jerk, his little fists balled into iron as Eiji hoisted him back up to his waist.

Satisfied, Max then retrieved a gun from his waistband, and held it out to Ash.

Ash eyed it, the frosty thing, the lifeless, brutal thing.

Cain’s gun, the one he had given to Ash for expressly this purpose.

He took it.

He did not look at Eiji and he took it, checked that it was loaded, and tucked the four rounds of ammunition Max held out with it into his back pockets. Next to him, Jessica undid the safety of her own gun.

“Right,” Max said, grim as he led them down the empty corridor. “Let’s get the hell out of here. This way!”

“Where are we going?” Jess asked.

“Emergency stairwell!” Max said, not looking back. “The elevators and the loading decks will be monitored.”

They jogged as fast as the smoke plume in the corridor allowed, and Ash saw exactly why Max had deployed the other two smoke grenades. Hidden near the doors to the surveillance rooms, they guaranteed that whatever guards ran out of there would run out blind. Thanks to that, both Max and him had to do little else but sock the gunmen in the gut to plant them face first into the ground. Jess brought up the rear, poised to shoot just in case any of them decided to stand back up, and Eiji and Michael stayed between them, dodging attackers when they could and ducking behind Ash or Max when they couldn’t.

They made efficient progress through the third floor, and Ash’s brain finally came online long enough to wonder what had tripped the blasted alarm.

“What’s this alarm?” he shouted over the din as they rounded another corner. “Do you think they found Sing?”

“Alex, come in; what’s Sing’s status?” Max pressed his earpiece further into his ear as a reply crackled on the other side.

What a blessing; the comms were still working.

“He’s clear,” he told Ash after a moment, gesturing to one of the stairwell doors. “Alex has him idling in the clearing with him and Kong. They’re okay.”

Ash nodded; that was good news, and it settled the writhing in his stomach to hear it. He wouldn’t have been able to look Shorter or Nadia in the eyes ever again if something happened to Sing. Even so, he eyed their surroundings suspiciously as he held the door open for Jess and the others to file through.

Because if the alarm wasn’t for Sing, then what the fuck was it for? And why was no one giving chase anymore? Sure, they couldn’t see too well through the smoke, but Ash couldn’t even hear any fumbling around.

The corridor behind them was growing quieter by the second, and the alarm was somehow getting louder and louder in his ears.

Max came through and shut the door behind them, but before Ash could even open his mouth to speak, he was already manhandling them all down the stairs.

“Lockdown,” he wheezed when Ash smacked his hands off, indignant and unwilling to move till he got an answer.

“What do you mean ‘lockdown’?” Ash rasped past the gravel in his lungs.

Max just sighed and shook his head, then had them rearrange their formation for descent. He led with Ash in the front, leaving Jess to make sure no one followed them down.

“They’re sealing the containment building,” he ground out as they took the stairs two at a time. “No one in or out. It’s the protocol that goes into effect when there’s a radiation leak. Which means we gotta get out before that alarm stops ringing. Because when it does, it’ll mean all doors are well and truly shut, and we’ll be stuck in here with a bunch of armed guards.”

Ash cursed. “Arthur. He must have tripped it.”

“Right now, I don’t care if my father’s toasted ghost tripped it,” Jess chimed in wryly. “Move, all of you!”

They fell silent after that, conserving breath, going as fast as their legs would allow. It was dimmer in the stairwell than it was outside, so Ash’s visibility was horrid, but he moved on instinct, counting the steps in the first set, then relying on the count to run as he came to the next. He would look behind him every now and then, to make sure Eiji and Michael were keeping up, and every time he did, Eiji gave him a smile, fleeting though it was, petals snatched into the wind.

It gave him hope.

They would make it, Ash told himself as the alarm beat unforgiving against his eardrums. They would make it out and everyone would be safe. They would, and then he would explain himself to Eiji and Eiji would forgive him and everything would go back to normal.

Ash wouldn’t be able to live with himself if it didn’t. He didn’t know what they were going to do about Golzine and BANANA FISH and Arthur; but he did know what it felt like to be happy now, and he could not give that up.

Not for the world. Not for the universe. Not even if it killed him.

Fate, however, thought mercy no better than sour milk.

So, it crinkled its nose and turned up its lip, and offered Ash nothing as his hand reached for the doorknob of the ground-level door. Because in the moment that his skin met stainless steel, the alarm switched off, and the silence stunned them all in place.

The lockdown protocol was complete. They were trapped.

“Shit.” Jessica rounded on Max even as he slapped a palm on his forehead. “Now what?”

“It changes nothing. We’re getting out,” Ash said automatically.

There had to be a way. There had to.

Just because fate was an unmerciful asshole didn’t mean Ash had to sit here and take it.

His brain slammed into overdrive as he considered the possibilities. Where were they in relation to the entrance he’d been brought through? Did he remember where exactly this stairwell door would open to? What was the closing mechanism like on the entrance doors? They were heavy-duty, and they’d needed a key card, but surely—

Oh. Hang on a second. What if they…

“Max,” he said, the germ of the idea growing in his mind. “Do you still have Alex?”

“I do. What do you need?”

“Have him track me. Which stairwell are we in? How far is the nearest door with an override?”

Max repeated the questions over the comms as Eiji sidled up to Ash. “What are you thinking?” he asked, his voice carefully low.

“A place like Wolfsbane, there’s no way they have complete faith in electric doors,” Ash explained, leaning into him. “There has to be a manual override on at least one of them. If we can find it—”

“Got it.”

Max’s voice cut him off, and Ash looked to him, fingers crossed childishly despite himself. “Okay, so the good news is we’re by the front entrance and this stairwell opens into the space behind the cooling pipes, so we’ll be hidden if we step out.”

Jess took this in stride but raised a brow. “What’s the bad news?”

“We’re across the room from the door.”

“So, there’s what, fifty armed guards between us and the exit?” she groaned.

“At least.”

Ash could swear Max sounded dejected, but when their eyes met, there was a flash in there, something like thrill and strobe lights; something like laser and audacity.

High risk, high reward.

“Alex said that it has a manual override though, a collection of three levers that we could pull to disengage the locking mechanism. And Charlie confirmed that the front lawn is taken care of, so if we’re able to make it out—”

“—we’d be free and clear,” Ash finished, fishing in the recesses of his body for his strength.

He could see it. The way forward. It wasn’t too late.

“Ugh. Fine. I’m down,” Jess said, more exasperated than anything else. “Everybody play the quiet game now.”

She went for the doorknob while Max covered her approach, his gun ready. When they were certain there was no trouble on the other side, they waved Eiji through, who kept one palm over Michael’s nose and mouth so he wouldn’t cry from the last of the smoke grenade fumes. Ash came up last, tracking their way forward as they clustered together behind a network of large pipes. Ash peered through the gaps between them, ignoring his nausea and déjà vu to get some sense of their next step.

There was not nearly enough chaos here for their needs, he noted with some distaste.

The door was far and away to their left, and seven gunmen had clustered before it in a tight semi-circle. Still more men roamed the area, crossing the width of the space every few minutes like cockroaches.

And worst of all, from somewhere in the darkness Ash could hear Arthur’s voice like a megaphone: “Find them! Find them! Search every inch of this facility! They have to be in here!”

Fuck, this was not good. They could not remain here indefinitely. They were hidden now, but they wouldn’t be forever. Eventually someone would look behind these pipes, and then their number would be up.

Quickly. He had to think of something quickly.

“Where are the override levers?” he hissed. “I don’t see them by the door.”

“There.” Eiji’s breath tickled the shell of Ash’s ear, and he followed the line of Eiji’s finger to the wall across from them.

Sure, there the levers were, utterly unguarded.

Only they were also two storeys off the ground next to a thin protruding ledge near the top of the door, and yes, the levers were only a stone’s throw away from the second-floor landing deck, but what good was that, when they were all the way down here?

Sure, there the levers were, utterly unguarded, yet utterly out of reach.

“What the fuck,” Max grumbled. “How are we supposed to get up there?”

“We could go back up to the second floor...” Jess suggested, but Ash shook his head, morose.

“There’s like twenty hostiles up there, and the smoke is nearly all dispersed,” he said, pointing at the gun barrels surveying the scene through the piping. “We don’t have the ammo to fight our way up and back down; the moment they spot us up there, all the others will converge on our location.”

“We could bring the police contingent back. Or the rest of the Mecha crew? Maybe a distraction, or maybe they could bust in—”

“—All the distractions on the outside won’t help us now, Max.” Ash gritted his teeth. Shit, shit, shit. This was getting worse by the second. “And that door is reinforced concrete, nothing’s busting in here, trust me.”

“All right, then, tough guy. Let’s hear your big idea.”

“Gimme a second, I’m thinking!”

“Well, think faster! We don’t have all day!”

“Quit it, Max! Hasn’t he done enough?”

“Shush! We are in fact hiding, Jess!”

“Oh, don’t shush me, you piece of—”

Ash tuned them out as best he could, but it didn’t help, because he could still hear the murmur of the men, and Arthur’s braying, and all the boots on the ground that weren’t close yet, but were getting closer and closer and closer, and God, where was the air in the room going to, had it always been this hard to breathe? Fuck, why couldn’t he get it together, why couldn’t he think, why wasn’t there another way, why was he so fucking useless, why was everything always his fucking fault—

“I can get up there.”

A knife couldn’t have stabbed Ash any harder. A wooden stake driven through his chest couldn’t have mangled his heart so completely as those words did.

All that vanilla and nightingale song in Eiji’s voice, and yet it wasn’t enough to cushion the impact. Ash clutched his chest as if he were bleeding anyway.

“No, you can’t, Eiji.”

“Yes, I can,” Eiji whispered. He was earnest now as he traced his path for Ash along the pipework lattice on the opposite wall. “Look, there is a good enough network of piping on that side of the room too. I can pull myself up—”

Ash refused to hear him.

“The pipes won’t hold your weight—”

“Honey, they look sturdier than what we practiced with at the Academy, trust me I can tell. And see there, I can use that scaffolding to get myself over the railing—”

Ash refused to entertain this for a second longer.

“But then they will all see you—”

“No, they will not, because you and Max will keep them busy. Run for the door; draw their fire—”

He would not have this. Absolutely not.

“The jump, though, what about that jump to the ledge?”

“Oh, I’ve made smaller jumps in my sophomore year, Aslan, really that’ll be the easy part—”

“Eiji!” Ash’s voice came out strangled, but he didn’t care. Really, it was a miracle he hadn’t actively shrieked. “No. Do you hear me? No.”

And that was when Eiji’s gaze hardened, like asphalt crusting on velvet.

Ash felt like he’d been slapped; he felt the hold of quicksand around his ankles as Eiji lifted himself out of the crouch they were all huddled in.

“I was not asking for permission, Aslan.”

Ash grabbed his wrist without thinking, yanking him back down to meet his eyes. “Are you crazy?! If you fall at any point, you’ll die. If any of them decides to fire at you, you’ll die. And even if you get to the levers in one piece, even if you manage to pull them, how do you expect to get back down without drawing attention to yourself, huh? I can’t guarantee we’ll have enough ammo left then to cover you; can’t you see, you’ll die, Eiji; if you do this you’ll die—”

“—and if we stay here any longer; if we don’t try this, then we will all die, Aslan.”

He wasn’t fevered when he spoke like Ash was, but his eyes blazed like a comet, a force of nature. “And if I’m going to die anyway, then I would rather die trying.”

“No,” Ash said again. “No, no, no, you won’t die, you can’t die, I won’t let you; I’ll hand the research over, I’ll go with Arthur, I’ll do anything, just please don’t—”

He was blubbering now, even as Eiji’s wrist slipped out of his grip, even as he pressed his cheek into Eiji’s palm just to convince him to stay. But he couldn’t muster up a fight, not nearly enough of one to truly stop Eiji. Because a traitorous, vile part of him, no matter how small, knew Eiji was right.

There was no other way.

This was their only solution; they were running out of time and Eiji was the only one among them who had a snowball’s chance in hell of actually scaling a wall well enough to pull this off.

Ash swallowed a sob when Eiji kissed his nose. “You’re not going anywhere with that monster. And you’re not handing anything over. I’ve had enough of this. No one is going to hurt you; I will not let them.”

Ash laughed then, helpless and aching. Those were his lines.

“Fuck you, Eiji. You’re the worst.”

That got him a flick on the forehead, a hushed “Go buy some me time,”, and then Eiji was gone, disappearing behind the piping while him and Max drew themselves to their full height.

“Remember what I taught you now, kiddo,” Max said, taking up Jess’ gun. She wasn’t going to be able to shoot for this next leg. No, she was taking charge of Michael, adjusting her hold on him to make sure he would be snug and protected in her arms.

“Warning shots, yeah?” he reminded Ash as he clicked off the safety. “Past their ears. Let me worry about dropping bodies. Always find cover. Conserve your ammo, nothing reckless. And—”

“—wait for them to reload to take my shots,” Ash recited, steeling himself. “I know, Max.”

Max looked proud of him then, just a little bit, Ash thought. He couldn’t be certain though. The grief and the regret were too intermingled with it all.

Regardless, it felt good. To be relied on, to be a defender for a change instead of a powerless kid. A part of Ash thought it was messed up to feel good about something like that, but it was all that he had in this moment, it was all that propelled him forward.

Especially once the shooting started.

Ash rather thought it was like being locked inside a mirrored cube with a disco ball, a flashlight and an erratically popping balloon arch, and being violently rattled.

He was woozy, yet he was wired; his arms smarted from the recoil, yet his body held together out of sheer spite. The world seemed to whiz past him as he followed Max, yet somehow everything seemed to move in slow-motion when he aimed his gun at the vague space above the guards’ ears.

And though he winced every time a body thumped onto the floor courtesy of Max; Ash found himself grinning as they approached the door.

They were doing it. They were going to get out.

They were almost there, and so was Eiji, Ash knew. Jess was their lookout and timekeeper, keeping an eye on Eiji’s movements as he clambered over the pipes and traded one support for the next, telling them when to move double-time and when to linger behind cover for longer.

“Almost there. He’s almost there,” she whispered when they were no more than twenty feet away.

Ash couldn’t watch him, not fully, not when the shooters demanded all his attention. But he snuck a glance when Eiji vaulted over the final railing, swift and effortless, demigod grace, avian precision. He sent another shot the gunmen’s way then, and none of them were any the wiser.

Eiji caught his eyes then, appreciative, and if this was anything less than life and death, Ash would have cheered.

“Tell Shunichi to bring the car around,” Max said to Alex through the comms. “We’ll be out soon.”

Oh, they were so close now. So close Ash could almost taste it.

So, when Max told him to stay back, to engage the others while he took out the seven in front of the door itself, Ash did as he was asked. It didn’t take long; Max was surgical as he shot, carefully weeding the gunmen out one by one until the door stood clear, unobstructed. They rushed towards it, Jess and Michael going on ahead while Ash stayed with Max to keep the remnants of the force engaged from behind a clump of empty drums.

All that was left was opening the door now, and Ash knew it would open, he had faith; just a little longer; all they had to do was hold on a little longer until—

A great grating sound went through the pandemonium like an axe through foam, and Ash looked up frantically as a drawn-out cry accompanied it. But it was okay, Eiji was unharmed; it was only the effort of pulling the lever that made him shout.

Only the first one was down now, but the other two levers were easier to bring down after the first had been pulled. And sure enough, two minutes later the door was sliding open, groaning while Eiji stood by the levers, beaming and triumphant.

Jess and Michael dashed forward the moment the door was open enough to squeeze through. Max was close behind them, but he hung back when he saw that Ash was not coming with.

“Kiddo? Come on, let’s go!”

“Not without Eiji!”

“Ash—”

Ash shoved him off when he felt Max tug at his arm. “No, Max; you go ahead if you want but I’m not leaving without him!”

“I’ll stay with him, Ash, you need to go!”

“No! No, Max, Jess and Michael need you, just go!”

“…They need you too, kiddo.”

“…”

“Ash, they—”

“Just stop arguing with me and go! You won’t convince me!”

Max made a noise like a dying whale, torn between Ash and the silhouette of Jess and Michael getting smaller and smaller in the distance, lit by the headlights of Shunichi’s car as it hurtled towards the gates.

Then he nodded decisively, shot the last three gunmen before them between the eyes, and began to run.

“You two better be right behind us!” he called over his shoulder.

“We will be!” Ash replied, not taking his eyes off Eiji, entranced as he made his way down, leaping and swinging from pipe to railing to landing deck and back again in a way that was almost gravitationally unsound.

Nymph-born, Eiji. Fire-heart, Eiji. Smug fucking bastard, Eiji.

It was here, in this moment when Ash finally had the courage to think it to himself.

I love you.

I want forever with you.

I want a youth and a mid-life crisis and a senility with you.

I want this moment and all of next year and an entire afterlife and every fucking second of eternity with you.

I love you.

He would wish later that he hadn’t been looking. He would wish that he hadn’t relaxed so much now that all the gunmen had been dispensed with. He would wish that he’d realized sooner that Arthur’s voice had disappeared somewhere in the soundscape of the shootout, and that could not, on any count, be a good sign.

Because no sooner was Eiji close enough for the ceiling lights to catch the focused twinkle in those mother-of-pearl eyes of his just so, a gunshot rang out, and Ash ducked behind the drums instinctively.

But then there was a thunk like a bag of sand hitting a tuning fork, a howl like a nightmare in anguish, and with a horror that only became blue skies raining blood, Ash understood.

The bullet had never been meant for him. It’d been meant for—

“Eiji!”

Ash swatted the drums out of his way, firing off two rounds in the direction that the bullet had come from. All other thoughts were forgotten, caution and self-preservation and endless machinations just gone, dissolved into his panic like salt in the sea. He could see nothing but Eiji now, still so far off the ground, hanging onto the first-floor deck railing with one hand, face crumpled in pain as he tried to pull himself up. His right leg, the one he always relied on was useless now, bullet buried somewhere near his knee.

Oh God, there was so much blood, and it was all over the ducky pyjamas, and Ash was running towards him already; he could catch Eiji; it was only one storey, if Eiji let go of the railing, then Ash could catch him—

Another gunshot sounded, this time dinging off the stretch of railing two inches from where Eiji held onto it.

Eiji let go on reflex, yelping like it was punched out of him, and Ash’s insides roiled like the devil himself was stirring them with a pitchfork. He dove to catch Eiji as he fell, but he was too far, too fucking far, and his voice tore itself to shreds when Eiji landed on his arm with a sickening crack.

“Eiji!”

Eiji’s neck was far too slack for Ash’s liking when he peeked up at him. But he had a smile on his face, like muslin caught on a bare branch, like the last leaf of the season turning gold. And his voice was molten crystal when he said, “Run, Aslan.”

But Ash would not, he could not, because his eyes had followed the trajectory of the bullet as he’d darted forward, and he’d seen the foul relish in the shooter’s gaze; he’d seen the kerosene and the rat poison and the rabid fucking glee, and instantly he’d known.

It was Arthur.

Ash stood, fury sharpening his senses as Arthur staggered haphazardly out of the shadows, clutching a bullet wound in his shoulder. Huh, Ash must’ve gotten him with that last volley he fired.

Good. That meant Arthur’s shooting hand, his Frankensteined hand would shake.

Lousy shot, careless motherfucker, and yet he’d taken a shot at Eiji?

The gall. The fucking audacity.

Bullet wound for a bullet wound; Ash’s mind reasoned as the air turned to vicious fumes in his lungs.

Oh, but it wasn’t just a bullet wound Arthur had given Eiji, had he? No, he’d broken into Eiji’s house, hit him on the head, tied him up, snapped his arm—

He’d insulted Eiji from Day 1, scared him, tried to poison everyone in Wolfsbane, tried to take his home, his life away from him—

He couldn’t be allowed to live.

Ash just couldn’t allow Arthur to live.

So, when Arthur levelled his gun at him, he roared, all hellfire and sulphuric acid, all vitriol and contempt.

And before Arthur could pull the trigger through his winded trembling, Ash began to shoot, straight into Arthur’s chest.

The first two bullets had been enough, one in Arthur’s liver, the other just narrowly missing his heart.

But Ash did not stop.

He kept shooting, even when Arthur’s body slumped onto the floor. Blood pooled around the corpse steadily, but Ash kept going.

Round after round, disfiguring what flesh was left.

At one point the clip emptied, but that didn’t stop Ash. He simply reloaded and began to shoot again.

And again. And again.

Only when he felt a hand clamp down on his shoulder did he stop, turning on whoever it was with a snarl. His finger pulled the trigger again as his arm moved in an arc, then hovered a hair’s breadth away.

He felt as though his head had been slammed into a glacier when the muzzle of the gun collided with Max’s chest, when he saw fresh blood trickling down Max’s left arm, the sleeve of his shirt ripped through.

Ash’s blood curdled, and his joints locked. That last shot…he—Max, he shot Max—

“That’s enough, kiddo,” Max wheedled, slowly wrapping his fingers around the barrel. “I’ll take that now.”

Suddenly, the gun felt like lava in Ash’s palms, and he instantly let it go. “Sorry. Sorry—I—Sorry…”

“It’s okay. It’s okay, kiddo. You’re okay.” Max was saying that, and yet Ash saw how fast, how urgently he tucked the gun back into his pants, as if it was imperative that he get it out of Ash’s sight.

Did Max think—?

The adrenaline was wearing off now, as was the anger. And in its place, there was…

There was…

Nothing. Nothing at all.

He—God, he’d just killed a man—no, it was worse, he’d killed a man and then mutilated the corpse, he’d hurt Max, and yet he could feel…nothing. Nothing.

Violent. Feral. Animal.

“You’re good at this, Lynx.”

Cold. Monster. Monster.

“You must have some sort of death wish.”

Demon. Evil. Evil. Evil—

A pained gasp shattered his trance, and Ash’s attention went to Eiji’s unmoving form. Tears sprang to his eyes, and he hated himself for the relief that filled him.

There, that was better. Sorrow, concern, shame. Feelings. He still had his feelings. He wasn’t—that wasn’t—

His eyes went to Max. “Eiji—”

Max regarded him with a pity that was familiar, and a consolation that was entirely unknown. “He’s unconscious. He didn’t see. Help me carry him. Shunichi is waiting outside.”

---

Eiji didn’t open his eyes till they were in the car, Shunichi swerving wildly to avoid the potholes. Jess sat up front with Michael, and Max sat next to Ash in the back, keeping the pressure on Eiji’s bullet wound so he wouldn’t bleed out.

The car was utterly silent, had been since they’d left the power plant and its carnage in the dust behind them.

All silent, except for Ash, who couldn’t stop bawling.

Loud, ugly, uncontrollable, he cradled Eiji’s face in his lap, brought their foreheads together, carefully, gently— “Watch that head wound of his, Ash”—of course he was watching, Jess, he wouldn’t hurt Eiji, he’d never hurt Eiji—

He kissed the corner of Eiji’s mouth, feeling Eiji’s breath coming in strained pants through his parted lips, taking strength from it, begging Eiji, “Wake up, please, wake up, don’t do this to me—”

“—Aslan.”

Ash instantly shut up, nearly beside himself when Eiji’s eyes opened, bright and wide, silver hail, obsidian glass. He looked happy. “You’re safe. That’s good.”

Never had Ash wanted to deck him in the mouth more than in this moment.

“Shut up,” he cried, petulant despite it all. “I’m not talking to you. I won’t ever talk to you again.”

Eiji made a gurgling sort of sound. His lips quirked up, but that was not his laugh; there was no music in it. Ash hated it.

“Don’t laugh. It’s not funny.”

“If you say so, honey.”

“You’re not allowed to do anything like that again, do you understand?”

“If you like, honey.”

“And shut your mouth! You need to conserve your energy so you can pull through this. You have to pull through this.”

“If it’d make you happy, honey.”

“Eiji!”

“Yes, honey?”

The moon was out now, the pale light streaming through the car window, and Ash watched it swirl into Eiji’s eyes. They yawned as if there was a great whirlpool in them, his lucidity draining into it with every passing second.

His words were muscle memory, Ash realized with a jolt.

Everything he was saying, he was saying on instinct. Like shivering in the cold, like flinching away from naked flames.

If Ash said so, if Ash liked, if it’d make Ash happy, honey, honey, honey.

As if he wasn’t lying here, half drenched in his own blood because of Ash.

Oh dear, Ash was weeping again.

Eiji’s cooed sympathetically to him, and Ash wept even harder when Eiji’s good hand came to brush the tears from his face.

“Why did you do that?” Ash asked, snuffling into the warmth of Eiji’s palm, just to remind himself that Eiji was still here, that he wouldn’t lose Eiji. “I told you it was dangerous, that you’d get hurt if you—”

“What can I say, honey? You make me reckless. You make me brave.”

Then Eiji’s eyes rolled back in his head, and he said no more.

And if Ash screamed loud enough to shock Michael into another fit of crying, then none of the adults in the car could find it in themselves to chastise him.

It seemed they’d all silently agreed that the limp, bloodied body of the boy he loved in his arms was punishment enough.

Chapter Text

Entry #11        Aslan Jade

The colour of lies.

The colour of stomach acid, hearts and guts yanked out of a body wholesale, neglect and mold and never looking back

The colour of goodbye. The colour of apology.

The colour of my eyes.

(Eiji says I’m not allowed to put anything else here. Apparently, over-intellectualizing my pain is detrimental to my mental health)

---

Some things just shouldn’t have blood on them.

White towels. Toddlers’ shoes. Leopard fur.

Eiji’s ducky pyjamas. Especially Eiji’s ducky pyjamas.

Ash scrubbed them harder, violently sloshing the soapy water he’d filled in Chang Dai’s bathroom sink. Hunched over the tiny bowl, he didn’t even bother to move the hair out of his eyes; hell, the bathroom light wasn’t even on. But he knew, Ash just knew, that the blood was still on them. He could see it.

Every time he closed his eyes, every time he blinked, Ash swore he could see nothing but blood soaking through those fluffy pyjamas.

He scrubbed harder, pumping out more hand soap from the bottle sitting next to the faucet. He used his nails, scratched at the dark blots, rubbed the cloth between his pruning fingers over and over again. Then one of his knuckles caught in the bullet hole in the right pyjama leg and he yelped, the sound leaving his throat so raw that it may as well have been flayed out of him.

Water spilled. Down the lip of the sink as he continued to wash, splatting deafening onto the tiles. Down his forearms, ice streams raising goosebump rapids. Down his cheeks, hot and exposed like live wires pressing into his skin.

Sweating profusely, not a morsel in his stomach, every leg muscle cramped, trigger finger still sore, and yet Ash couldn’t even bring himself to sit for a moment. He had to get this blood out first. Before he did anything else, he had to get this blood out.

He couldn’t hear anything beyond the splashing of the stagnant water, beyond the wet slaps of the material on porcelain. Then again, he’d ceased to hear much of anything after Eiji had passed out in the car.

It was like his insides had filled up with slow-drying wax, like all the air in his lungs had congealed to his windpipe. He’d been reduced to nothing but a shallow-breathing dead-weight with a pounding headache and tremor-wracked hands. And somehow, Ash had still thought he deserved to hold onto Eiji so tightly that it’d taken both Nadia and Shunichi to manhandle him out of the car.

After they’d finally succeeded in peeling him off of Eiji’s body, they’d put Eiji on the little sofa in Chang Dai’s back office. Ash hadn’t done much but dither in the doorway while Nadia took stock of Eiji’s injuries. He’d felt bereft, like a mangled feather: stark, fragile, doomsday-spinning through the air with no end in sight.

He’d wanted to fall already.

He’d wanted to hit the ground and break his back and crack open his ribcage just so he stopped feeling like his own bones were squeezing the life out of his heart.

But the drop had never come. Not when Max had collapsed into the desk chair to nurse his bullet wound. Not when Jess had hopped up onto the desk before him, cooing to a hyperventilating Michael. Not even when the simultaneous clattering of several first-aid boxes had smacked into Ash’s senses, as he’d stared at the ruin around him.

But then Nadia had approached Eiji’s right pant leg with a pair of scissors, and Ash’s stomach had promptly dropped like hot lead through a frozen lake.

“What’re you doing with those?”

“Cutting away his pants, Ash; I can’t see how bad his bullet wound is.”

“No.”

“No?”

“No. They’re his favourite pyjamas, his—his dye-making pyjamas—”

“Ash—”

“—best thing in his closet, Nadia, he told me so—”

“They’re drenched in blood, Ash—”

“—No, but he loves them, he loves them; I’ll fix it, I can fix it, please—please don’t cut them—”

“Okay. Okay, I won’t, alright? Breathe, Ash. You’ve got to breathe—hey, look at me, I won’t cut them. Just—Just help me get him out of those, okay? I need to know if we need to call an ambulance.”

Next thing Ash had known was the bathroom, his wrists deep in lukewarm tap water and watermelon-scented soap. He wasn’t even sure how he’d got there. Only that there had been far too much blood on Eiji’s favourite fucking ducky pyjamas, and some things just shouldn’t have blood on them.

Ash knew that. He was trying. He was trying, he’d been trying, so why wouldn’t those damn bloodstains come off already—

“Ash? You okay?”

Ash shuddered for a moment, his limbs going wooden the next. Of all people, he was having the hardest time looking Jessica in the eyes. Just his luck that she’d be the one to come check on him.

“Fine,” he managed, the garble in his voice reminding him that he hadn’t in fact stopped crying since they’d gotten in the car at the power plant.

“Your arm’s bleeding, kiddo. Real fucking bad.” This came to Ash from closer than before, but it was somehow softer, as if Jess was trying to speak to a house of cards.

Ash felt knots in his temple. He didn’t deserve that, that consideration. You didn’t twist barbed wire with your bare hands; you just didn’t.

“Just a graze,” he assured, hoping she’d leave. “The bullet didn’t lodge or anything.”

“You got shot?”

“No, Eiji got shot. Max got shot,” Ash spat automatically, every word shrapnel and arsenic. “Some motherfuckers just shot at me. We done now?”

“Watch your tone, brat.”

Jess’ fingers closed inflexibly enough around Ash’s wrist to bring his cleaning efforts to a resounding halt, and he flinched like she’d slapped him. Still, she held on, adamant.

“I just want to patch you up,” she said. “You’re the last of our wounded.”

No. No, he had no right. He had lost it; Ash was sure.

“Yeah, well, I’m in the middle of something, so fuck off.”

Moonlight caught the edge of Jess’ gaze like a razor blade. “Aslan Jade!”

Oh, that was exasperated. That was full of pity.

So naturally, Ash lost it.

“Fucking what, Jess?! You gonna tell me to mind my language? Why do you give a fuck what I do anyway, huh? I’ve done nothing but put your family in danger since day one. I’m the one who got your kid kidnapped, I’m the one who shot your husband, so what the hell are you still doing here? Griff wasn’t even your friend; why do you even care—”

“Because you’re my goddamn child, Aslan!”

Jess was heaving, big blue eyes so fractured with indignation, but she whirled Ash around so he had to face her.

“I read you bedtime stories. I stole contraband mustard from Camelot’s elite warehouses because you loved it on your sandwiches. I melted my engagement ring down just so you’d have something to solder with for your first robot, for Christ’s sake! This isn’t about Griff; it never was, not for me. I’ve given a fuck about you from day one because you deserved love just like every other child, and you sure as shit didn’t need to shoot out of me for that. So, how’s about you shut your sass-mouth for once and retract your claws for two fucking seconds, so that I can make sure you’re not gonna bleed to death here on the bathroom floor? Because we didn’t survive Arthur and half the Golzine cavalry just for you to self-destruct in a dark corner.”

Ash crumpled then, hugging her like the helpless baby he’d been the day they’d found out Griff had died. He was taller than her now, a bundle of bones that did nothing but stab into her, he was certain. But still she held him, all his bloodied odds and ends, his sticky, crying face, his wet hands that were still white-knuckling Eiji’s pyjamas.

“I’m sorry, Mama,” he whimpered into her shoulder. “I didn’t mean anything by it. It just hurts so much—”

“I know, kiddo. Mama’s sorry too.” She kissed the top of his head, but didn’t make him look at her again, let him hide. “The last thing I wanted was for you to hurt like this.”

“The gun—I don’t know what happened; I was just so angry, and—and it just went off, honest, I didn’t mean—not Max, I never meant to—”

“I know, Ash. And Max knows too. We’re not mad, okay?” Jess said, stroking his back. “No one is mad at you. You saved our lives. All our lives.”

Ash shook his head vehemently, bile and snot fighting to choke him as he struggled to breathe. “But Eiji—Eiji—”

“Is gonna be just fine,” she finished for him, tilting his face to hers. There was something stone-etched about her smile, mulish like hope. “Bless that boy; he’s stubborn; he’d bite the dickens out of the Reaper himself if he came for him before he was ready.”

Ash couldn’t help but laugh. He thought of Eiji on the floor of that power plant, bullet wound in his leg, fragment of bone sticking out of his arm, dazzling fucking smile on his face.

A smile for every circumstance. God, Ash knew there were other Vitae kids, others who had the same survivor’s vibrance that Eiji did, but when he thought about that smile, he knew there’d never be another like Eiji.

“Sounds about right,” he muttered to no one at all. “He’s not the type to let anything go without a fight.”

“You included,” Jess commented, half-teasing, half-kind. “He was in and out of consciousness when we put him in the ambulance. Asked for you every time he opened his eyes.”

The glimmer of a grin on Ash’s face grew murky again, and he sank to the floor, sopping pyjamas on his lap, clutching his bleeding arm because that’s when it actually started to throb.

“I don’t bring him anything but danger. I’m the kind of person he needs to stay away from. I get it now.”

He thought of Eiji’s fingers tracing that first bruise Arthur had given him the night of the blackout, like clouds and salve on his cheek. He thought of how every time he’d led Eiji to his room, he’d made sure to kick the box of textbooks that hid his gun farther under the bed before pushing him down on it. He thought of Eiji’s earnest questions about his life on Elysium, his life before Earth, and how he would distract Eiji with kisses every time, change the subject every time.

Coward. Liar. Monster.

“No…no, actually I’ve known it all this time. I just couldn't accept it; I wanted him too bad. God, I’m pathetic, aren’t I, Jess?”

“No, kiddo.” Jess said it like she believed it, but also like she knew her words were futile. “Nothing pathetic about loving someone.”

Ash shrivelled up into himself like a worm doused in salt water. There was a small belligerent part of him that wanted to shout, ‘How dare you?’ How dare she name that mutual gravity out loud before Ash even could?

Not that he could do that anymore. Any right Ash had had to say those words to Eiji, he’d squandered when he’d let Eiji slip from his arms the morning after his birthday.

…No.

No, he’d squandered the right even before then, squandered it before they kissed, before Eiji steadied his hands as he painted, before their fingers had first brushed under a starry sky and Ash had felt the inklings of that full-supernova joy.

He’d squandered it the day he’d decided to lie to Eiji just to stay in his orbit a moment longer.

Ash was sure of it.

Selfish. Liar. Monster.

“I…I’m never seeing him again, Jess. He deserves more than this, better than this, only the best. And so—so do you and Mikey.”

Ash looked up at her, his insides pulling together at last, tendons super-glue, ligaments duct tape. “Max is right. We’ll never get to be happy until this is over. I’m done running. I’m taking the fight to Golzine, and so help me God, when I’m done with him, he will leave us alone.”

Ash panted as if he’d run for miles, biting out every word like it wouldn’t leave his mouth without cutting on his teeth. A silence yawned between them, but then Jess sat down next to him on the floor. And when Ash put his head on her shoulder, she pressed him closer.

“I’m proud of you, kiddo.”

---

“Everything in order?”

What a question to ask while sitting in a jumble of extension cord wire and assorted CPU parts, trying to balance a laptop with a chipped display on skinned knees. Not that Ash had a choice in the matter; the Wolfsbane Airport Correspondence Centre wasn’t exactly the place for clandestine conversations with double agents of the space colony resistance.

So here he was, back in the basement of the Academy’s Cyber department at some ungodly hour of the night, making demands of the grainy face of Cain Blood. Who, for his part, was slouched over some sort of workbench that was less metal and more dismembered gun.

“I don’t know, you tell me, Lynx,” he scoffed, smiling as if it was ridiculous that Ash was even asking.

And sure, Ash may have been exhausted in a way that didn’t stop with smarting half-healed bullet wounds. A frigid vacuity weaved in and out of his skin like some sort of torturous never-ending crochet needle, but never let it be said that he backed down from a challenge.

“Private hangars?” he began.

“One in the safest part of the electronic black market, another occupying such prime Elysium real estate, you can see the MIRA from the workroom window,” Cain replied, ticking them off on his fingers.

“Second-hand Vultures?”

“Three. One extra for luck.”

Not bad, not bad at all. But was it enough?

“Safe house?”

“Secured.”

“On Atlantis or Camelot?”

“The fuck d’you take me for, some kind of amateur? It’s in Eden, as it should be. No central alliance influence.”

Ash raised an approving brow, and Cain grinned back, properly smug.

“How about fireworks?”

“Old-school revolver for you, sub-machine beast for Max and a carnage-first sawed-off baby for Jess. Complete with ammo, so don’t even go there.”

“No, far be it for me to patronize the darling of the Combat department,” Ash quipped wistfully, the weight of it all sitting heavy on his shoulders.

It all seemed so far away now, Cain cast in the role of intimidating upperclassman, showing him the ropes, laughing at him full force when he got things wrong, because it “just doesn’t happen often enough, Lynx”.

Ash had gotten so comfortable being clumsy here, being ill-informed and under-planned and blasé.

And the universe had slapped him upside the head for it.

So now he was back to being jittery, back to being paranoid, back to going to every worst-case scenario before it arrived and thinking his way out of it.

“So do I get my flowers now?” Cain joked.

“Soon,” Ash promised dryly. “I got one more question.”

“Shoot.”

And God, that was about as innocuous as innocuous got, but Ash still dug his fingers into his jeans so hard he felt one of his nails bend painfully against the denim.

Two weeks.

Two whole weeks and he was still balking like he’d fired that gun into Arthur’s disfigured corpse not thirty seconds ago.

He tried to keep the tremble out of his voice. “Where’s my ride?”

Cain grew melancholy then, pensive and fidgety. “Shorter’s enroute already. Practically jumped down the phone when I called to let him know that he was cleared to come get you. He’s been worried sick—”

“Of course, he was; Nadia and Sing were way too close to the fighting—”

“—About you, Ash.”

Ash didn’t say anything. He was sure Cain wouldn’t like what he had to say to that.

He shouldn’t waste his energy. Not on me.

“You and Eiji.”

“Don’t.” Ash barked it out before he knew what he was doing. “I don’t—I don’t wanna hear his name.”

Cain sighed, like he was being forced to help a toddler through a tantrum with nothing but a sparkly pipe cleaner and a broken record. “Don’t you? That’s new. Used to be you got all pink in the face hearing it. Used to be you couldn’t keep it out your damn mouth, always saying it like nobody else could say it just right, not like you could. What’s changed?”

Everything, Ash wanted to sob. Everything.

He saw me, he wanted to scream. I am a festering wound for a person, and he saw me. There is blood and pus and decay on my soul, and he saw me.

“I’ve hurt him. Lied to him; broken his trust. Seems fair enough to me.”

The admission that finally left him was almost mundane, but it was true as much as it was sparse, and Ash could not be arsed to give Cain any more than that. There was nothing left in him to give. His mind wouldn’t abandon him now, but he’d thrown up his insides trying to banish his nightmares, and his heart had always been Eiji’s anyway.

He was out of options, out of excuses, and out of fucks to give about either of those things.

But Cain, fuck him straight to hell, was persistent in a way that only a friend could be.

“Eiji’s hurt pretty bad, isn’t he? I talked to Sing; they’ve put plates and screws in him; got him high off his ass too; anaesthesia, anti-inflammatory shit, pain meds—”

“I—They told me he would be fine. They said he would pull through.” Ash repeated it to himself just as much as he said it to Cain. The prayer was well-worn in his mouth, and it rolled off his tongue like dogma, because there was no reality that could hold him where it wasn’t true.

“’Course he will, he’s Vitae; that’s not the fucking point, Lynx. The point is why is anyone having to tell you that? Why haven’t you gone to see any of it for yourself?”

“You know why,” Ash growled, malevolent. “I told you why. I’m a monster, and I don’t deserve—”  

“Wow. Never thought I’d see the day you fell apart.”

Cain studied him with some measure of disbelief, some measure of sympathy, like he could see Ash’s armour and thought it lacking and redundant.

“Get your head out of your ass and stop torturing yourself, would you?” he said, staring Ash down. “You got all these ideas about what you do and don’t deserve; you ever stop to think what you want? What Eiji wants?”

Oh, the anger was coming back now, returning in froth and swell like a new-formed wave, and it was all Ash could do to not snarl at Cain.

Yeah, they were friends, and yeah, Ash respected him, but he had no fucking business weighing in on what went on between Eiji and him.

Nobody did.

Him and Eiji, the star-death, cosmic-truth, proto-universe thing between them was theirs and nobody else’s.

Private.

“Stop looking at me like that; you can’t set me on fire through the screen,” Cain scolded, jolting Ash back to rationality before he sliced open his lip on his worrying teeth. “Look, Shorter will be there in forty-three hours. You don’t have time to fix whatever you think you fucked up, but you have time to say goodbye. If you’re not gonna do anything else, at least say goodbye.”

Ash deflated then, burying his face in his hands. “I—God, what the fuck am I even supposed to say, Cain?”

“Don’t even try me. I’ve watched you bumble round that planet since the moment you got there, Starboy. You can’t tell me that after all this time, you’ve got nothing to say to Eiji Okumura.”

Ash huffed a weary breath. Nothing he could say out loud. Nothing that wouldn’t break Eiji’s heart.

And that was if Ash hadn’t smashed it to pieces already, by putting Eiji in harm’s way, by getting him hurt, by making him provide comfort when he was in immense pain himself, by—

By not going to see him for two whole weeks.

Shit. Ash was an idiot. A guilty, selfish idiot.

“…Keep me posted on Shorter’s trajectory. I’ll tell Max and Jess to start packing up.”

“Ash—”

“Goodnight, Cain. I owe you three.”

---

Some things would always have blood on them.

Battlefields. Asphalt near playgrounds. Baby teeth.

Ash’s hands. Especially Ash’s hands.

He watched them shake as they shifted the cardboard box in them from right to left, as the right one made a fist and poised itself to knock on Eiji’s door. He took in the woodgrain, the burgundy stain that had intrigued him so that first time he’d come up to the ninth floor.

“Beetroots!” Eiji had told him, proud, resigned.

“I only grew them once. They needed too much water, and I couldn’t sustain them. Beautiful colour though, yes? Wouldn’t have wasted it on my stupid door if I knew how little dye I’d be able to make with them.”

“I like your stupid door,” Ash had told him, baffled, charmed. “It’s pretty. Nothing like it in all of Wolfsbane, is there?”

And oh, Eiji had smiled at him as if his whole perspective had spun on its axis to the dark side of the moon. There’d been a magnetism between them, the draw of a lush sort of abandon, even then. It was as if he’d heard everything that Ash had been hiding in his throat.

I like you, stupid. You’re pretty. Nothing like you in all of Wolfsbane, is there?

Eiji always seemed to do that. Heard everything Ash wasn’t saying, cracked open every bulletproof sentiment that tumbled from his lips only to speak to the frail, battered thing under it. That ravenous, clawed, delicate thing inside Ash that had spent every moment since its conception banging on his wretched veneer, begging to be known, and cared for despite it.

And Eiji, he had this way of kissing its split knuckles and bringing it away from the chaos and massacre.

Sweet night in his eyes, only starlight. A soothing light, nothing blinding, nothing condemning, nothing harsh in him, not for Ash.

“Not so fast, everything easy, yes? Nice and slow for you, honey. Just how you want.”

Yes, everything slow. Everything overflowing, unending, overwhelming, just like the night of Ash’s seventeenth birthday. Ash remembered it in one million colours, even though there was nothing in that room but pastel sheets and pale moonlight and—

And Eiji.

Old-Hollywood magic in every smile, midnight-showing audacity in every touch, double-feature indulgence in every word.

God, those sheets had tangled around them just right, and there had been so much giggling; earth and life and fragrant demise in Ash’s hair as the rose tucked behind his ear crushed itself into the pillows, his skin parched, his heart starved, his mouth yielding.

All for Eiji.

Eiji, who never made him beg, never even made him ask, just gave, gave, gave. As if he could feel Ash’s mind catastrophizing from the way his pulse jumped under his lips.

As if every drag of Ash’s fingernails down his back shouted out the want more, no time, terrified, can’t lose you looping in Ash’s mind.

As if every time Ash sunk teeth into his bottom lip, just shy of bruising, the lament was clear:

You’ll leave.

You will, because I couldn’t possibly be worth it; I can’t be, but I want to be. Let me be, tell me how to be, I want to be worth it, I want to deserve this, deserve you.

As if every babe, mmm, yes, please that shattered high and reedy out of Ash rent him open to Eiji, no matter what he did to keep all his pining, shameful truths from haemorrhaging.

I want to make this last forever.

I want to live in the infinite space between this second and the next, have a ‘forever’ with you in this ‘just for now’.

I don’t deserve one, I know I don’t, but I’m a coward and a bastard, and I’m not above stealing it.

I’m a wreck and a mess and fucked up five ways to Friday, and stealing a forever with you is probably the worst thing I’ll ever do, but it is not beneath me, Eiji, and even when I do choke to death on all my mistakes, I won’t fucking regret this.

Because it’s you, Eiji. It’ll always be you.

It should have scared him out of that bed, out of his hide, the sheer vulnerability of lying there like that: no armour, Eiji seeing all the things he didn’t want seen. But there had been no fight in him, not that night, because Eiji was close, crooning to his earthquaking mind, all his whispers sparking like blown fuses and short-circuits against Ash’s cheeks.

“Hush now, honey. You’re safe here. I’ve got you. We have all night. I’m not going anywhere. Relax, honey, let me take care of you—”

Yes, Eiji had always heard them, all the things Ash never had the courage to say. But that was before he’d known Ash was a liar.

Liar. Selfish. Monster.

Would he hear them now, all the things Ash couldn’t say? Would he ever forgive Ash for what he was about to do?

He drew in one last breath, then knocked on the door. Three sharp raps that seemed to reverberate through the night, dense and rain-laden as it was, the shadows soggy under Ash’s feet.

“Yes? Who is it?”

His voice nearly unravelled Ash right there. Eiji always came to the door, something or the other clattering behind him, and he never sounded like that, like a dusty old cassette tape that had been scratched to ribbons.

“It’s me.”

The words hung in the air for a moment, long enough for Ash to wonder if he hadn’t been heard. Then on an exhale fluttering like birds taking flight, there was, “Come in.”

Ash pushed against the door with his good shoulder, the clicking of the doorknob ricocheting in his skull. He stepped over the threshold, and locked the door after him without looking, a quick flick of his wrist behind his back.

He’d been convinced before now, that the last thing he’d want to see was Eiji prone and injured, with none of his strong, easy grace about him. That he wouldn’t be able to bear it, after seeing Eiji covered in so much blood.

And yet. Yet.

Hellfire at his heels couldn’t have made him tear his eyes off Eiji now.

Propped up on the couch, fluffy pillows tucked under him, and blanket draped over his legs. Wearing that old tank top whose left strap always fell over his shoulder, exposing that cute little mole on his collarbone. Some botany textbook with yellowing pages pointedly not falling apart under his fingers as he folded down the top corner to mark his place.

For a second, Ash could almost pretend that nothing had happened at all. That he’d only stolen away to pick up leftovers for dinner from his parents’ house, and they’d eat together wrapped up in the blanket like they always did.

Almost.

But it wasn’t dinner time, and the bandages on Eiji’s left arm and right leg had him resting them rigid and unnatural. Ash’s parents’ house had gone back to being the singular empty apartment on the sixth floor that could support electrical wiring, and Shorter was only ten hours and thirty-seven minutes away. There was an empty space by Eiji’s side that Ash didn’t have the courage to claim again, and there was rain in the air.

Their summer was over, and Ash hadn’t come to stay another night.

He’d come to say goodbye.

And yet, yet, when Eiji looked at him, he was helpless just as he’d always been.

“Hi, honey. Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes?”

Ash laughed despite himself. Oh, Eiji. He was going to make some lucky bastard very happy one day.

“You’re high.”

“Not really.” The words did run over each other ever so slightly, but Eiji pointed to the half-used pill strips on the coffee table. “Haven’t taken my night dose yet.”

Good, he was lucid then. He’d get angry just like Ash planned, hate him just like Ash planned, throw him out of his apartment, out of his life. Just like Ash planned.

Decisive, clean break. Seamless. Painless.

For Eiji, anyway. Just as he deserved.

Ash squirmed in place, trying to figure out how he was going to broach the subject. But his unease didn’t escape Eiji’s notice, so he spoke before Ash had a chance.

“Are you okay?” He gestured to Ash’s wounded shoulder.

Ash fought down the truth. Instead, he shrugged, as fluid and unaffected as he could muster. “It’s just a scratch.”

Eiji seemed unconvinced but huffed fondly, as if he’d expected to hear no different. He held out his unbandaged hand. “Come here.”

No. Ash couldn’t. Because some things would always have blood on them, and Ash’s hands left their stain on everything they touched. He set the box in his hands down on the bookshelf by the door but went no closer to the couch.

If he went, he’d touch Eiji, and he didn’t want to touch Eiji with blood on his hands.

“What’s in the box?” Eiji’s asked, bewildered, his arm still out, palm still open for Ash’s own.

Ash clasped his hands behind his back. “I…I made it for you. For your birthday.”

“Oh, sweet honey, my birthday isn’t for months,” Eiji smiled all too easily. “Just give it to me then.”

Ash shook his head, small jerking motions that made sure he couldn’t meet Eiji’s eyes.

“No? Why not?”

Right. This was his cue. He really should say it now. But Ash’s eyes were clamped shut, and his teeth chewed the inside of his mouth.

One more minute.

The dream was breaking, he was waking up. But one more minute, damn it. One more minute.

“Honey? Why can’t you give it to me on my birthday?”

Thirty more seconds…

“Aslan. Tell me why you can’t give it to me on my birthday.”

Oh, those words had scraped, corrugated iron in the wind, a stone losing its hold just before a landslide. Even so, when Ash opened his eyes, he saw that Eiji still had his arm out, patient, trusting.

He swallowed dryly. This was it. No more lies.

“I’m leaving Wolfsbane.”

Eiji’s hand dropped back to his side with a sickening thud.

“When?”

The lamplight bounced off the tears in Eiji’s eyes, flickering like rebellious lightning skipping over a mirror.

“Tomorrow morning. At dawn.”

“Where are you going?”

Ash pointed up to the sky with one limp finger. He should have known that wouldn’t be answer enough for Eiji. His gaze burned into Ash like concentrated sunbeams. “Where, Aslan?”

“I can’t tell you.”

And just like that, the twinkle in those eyes went out, and Ash found himself staring straight into woodsmoke and soot instead, forest fire trapped in a snow globe.

He felt like he’d been rammed chest-first into an iceberg. Had the room always been so deep-sea-tragedy cold?

“Aslan. It has been sixteen mornings,” Eiji said, sitting up as straight as he could, rust and rock-salt scabbing over every word. “So now I think it is time for explanations, yes?”

Ash could offer nothing more than the refrain, not without putting a target on Eiji’s back by association. The less he knew, the safer he’d be. “I can’t tell you.”

He expected the shouting to start now, but Eiji only laughed, mirthless, the sound practically gouged out of him. “You wound me, honey. Am I that much of a liability?”

Ash’s eyes widened, and he turned away, unexpectedly chastised. “I didn’t say that,” he said in a small voice. “I’m just trying to keep you safe.”

“And you?” Eiji challenged. “Who’s keeping you safe, Aslan? Because I’m assuming that wherever you’re going is all kinds of dangerous.”

That got Ash to properly glare at him. Damn it, this was not going the way he thought it was going to at all. Eiji wasn’t raising his voice, but Ash wasn’t stupid. He could read the tension in his posture; in the way his softness had fallen away to expose the real reasons he was such a bloody comfort to the people around him.

His steady, relentless care. His obstinate, unflinching loyalty. His absolute fucking nerve.

Everything that made him the only person who was willing to take Ash on in an argument.

“Who do you think I am? Some sort of shrinking violet?” Ash snapped, his voice growing talons. “You don’t understand a damn thing about the world I’ve survived in! I don’t need to be protected, Eiji; I can handle myself. And I’ve got back up. Max, Shorter, Cain—”

“So, everyone knows what this is? Everyone but me?”

And fuck, Ash had been preparing to launch into a righteous tirade there, about all the ways in which this was far more frightening and complicated than Eiji could even imagine, about all the ways he did not belong in the filth that was par for the course in Ash’s life. But seeing the abject horror on Eiji’s face slammed him into an iceberg again, and he clammed up instantly.

Was heart-freeze a thing? Because Ash was feeling it now, watching Eiji fall back against the pillows like he was just so tired, his good arm thrown over his eyes like he was trying not to cry.

“Wow. You really don’t tell me anything when it comes to something important. I don’t have a shred of your trust, do I?”

Liar. Selfish. Monster.

“That…is not true, you know it isn’t,” Ash rasped weakly. It wasn’t, it wasn’t, he never was as much himself as he was around Eiji, he felt safe enough for it, he did, he did, he did— “For fuck’s sake, Eiji, I care about you more than anyone; I trust you more than anyone; I never said I didn’t.”

The hand came away from Eiji’s eyes then, and when they met Ash’s again, they were accompanied by this glass shard of a smile. One that ripped through the naïve part of Ash that still wanted to believe that Eiji was angry, not incredibly, indelibly hurt.

Hurt by him.

“It doesn’t matter what you say, Aslan, if you don’t act like it.”

And that? That disintegrated what remained of Ash’s composure.

“Oh, you know what, fuck you! God, you’re so—” Ash wiped aggressively under his eyes, furious that he’d somehow started crying now. “You just don’t fucking understand—If something happened to you—”

Eiji cut him off with another one of those humourless scoffs and Hell on Earth, Ash was starting to loathe that sound—

“Please, I think we’re past that point, something’s already happened to me!”

“Yeah, and I will hate myself for the rest of my life for letting it!” That part Ash screamed so loud he was positive he rattled the mugs sitting in Eiji’s cabinets and tore into the fabric of the night. He felt turned inside out, doubled over and sobbing as he was, leaning ungainly against the door even though all he wanted was to curl into a ball and disappear into the floor.

He heard the blanket rustling from the couch as he held his head in his hands, heard Eiji call his name, one syllable splintering on the other, pleading, “Come here please, honey” but Ash wouldn’t, he wouldn’t go.

He was almost grateful that Eiji couldn’t walk without assistance at the moment. Because God knew if he could’ve, he’d have just come to Ash himself, gathered him close to his heartbeat, and been tainted with Ash’s pain just like everyone else.

A twisted mercy, but Ash was thankful for it.

“Never again, Eiji,” he swore, meeting Eiji’s eyes through the gaps in his fingers, not a waver in his voice. “If anyone ever hurts you again, it’ll be over my dead body. I promise you that. And if I have to keep secrets from you, if I have to leave you to honour that promise then I will. I don’t care what I have to do; no one gets to hurt you again.”

Eiji’s tears spilled from his eyes at last, and it felt like rain. The death of morning, the dawn of understanding. “Alright…. alright, honey. I can—I will drop it. Just one last question? Please?”

Ash waved his hand ‘yes’, he just couldn’t deny him, not when Eiji was looking at him like this, like a powerless lighthouse on the opposite shore watching a ship dash itself on treacherous coasts.

“When will you come back?”

Ash smiled at him, a miserable thing, a tattered dove stuck in tar.

Oh Eiji. His Tantalean punishment. His Orphean devotion.

“I don’t know.”

Eiji nodded, sniffling and something in him began to shift. Ash regarded him, confused, as the defeat leeched from his form, as the panicked quake in his shoulders ceased, as his eyes grew sure again. Like divinity rushing back into a statue, like roots expanding out from a great tree, like storm surging through a river, drowning, building, thundering towards something marvellous—

He held out his hand to Ash. Open, patient, trusting. Like before.

“That’s okay. I love you. I can wait.”

The air ruptured, the sky began to weep in earnest and Ash howled like rhapsody smothered by manacles. Next thing he knew, he was pushing off the door.

To hell with his terror. To hell with his shame. To hell with the blood on his hands.

Eiji would be his.

For one more minute. For one last time.

He crossed the room in three inelegant stumbles, and the first touch of Eiji’s hand in his own felt like diving into whiskey. The world faded into static, warmth flooded his veins, and all the reasons why not whited out as Eiji pulled him on top of him.

“Your bullet wound—” The cursory protest slipped from Ash’s lips, but he was already reaching for Eiji’s face—

“—is below my knee, this is fine, I am fine, just come here, Aslan—”

The breath rushed out of Ash in a bursting whine as Eiji hoisted him effortlessly onto his lap with his uninjured hand, and God, Ash would never tire of that—

Do you think he could pick you up with one hand?

He crashed like gale against Eiji’s chest, his fingers twining into his hair. He wouldn’t pull, wouldn’t aggravate that mending head wound, no, but he wasn’t going to touch anywhere else, not until they’d kissed. And kiss they did, fast and craving and unstoppable, and oh, Ash loved slow with Eiji, he loved decadent and lazy and endless, but where that was like melting, sinking, dissolving, this was like speeding, flying, exploding—

“Mm, honey—love you—”

Ash bore down on him, pressing Eiji farther into the pillows, just enough finesse in him to mind the head wound as he kissed the mole on Eiji’s collarbone over and over again. “Fuck you, babe, you’ve got no sense of timing—”

And while that firm one-handed hold on his waist wasn’t electric fire like when Eiji squeezed his thighs, Ash squeaked nevertheless when he pinched his hip.

“Don’t you talk to me about timing,” he murmured, nosing past Ash’s hair and nipping at his earlobe in a way that had Ash tugging him even closer. “If this is all I will have for a while, then I’m going to make the most of it. So, get used to it, Aslan, because I am not going to shut up for a single second—”

Oh, this wasn’t the drifting thing they were doing on his birthday, this was no syrupy inertia.

No, this was atmospheric fucking re-entry.

Hurtling, white-hot, no breaks, no heat shield, just them, gashed and hurting and afraid, but still so safe, so right with each other; God, how was Ash was ever going to stop—

“I missed you; I missed you, Eiji; fuck, you sure you’re okay?” Ash mumbled every time Eiji left his lips alone long enough to kiss his temples, his nose, the base of his neck just where his bandages began, “I missed you so much; it hurt so bad, babe, God, you have no idea—”

“—I have no idea?” Eiji’s amusement bubbled out from deep in his chest, and Ash had to kiss him some more; his forehead, his eyelids, his fingers when his hand finally came round to brush Ash’s tears from his cheeks. “I’ve just been sitting here, useless, for days, half out of my mind while you’ve been out there doing God knows what. I was worried sick about you, worried sick that you meant it when you said you’d never talk to me again—”

Ash had no justifications, only apologies, and he kissed him hard, desperate, into Eiji’s lips. “I’m sorry, I never meant—I just couldn’t—fuck, sorry, sorry—”

“Shh, honey I know, don’t be sorry, I know—”

But Eiji didn’t, he couldn’t know, because Ash wasn’t actually saying any of it out loud, was he?

What good would it do to say it, if he was just going to leave?

And yet. Yet, that sullen, aching, mauled-rose part of Ash wanted Eiji to know, wanted Eiji to believe.

It’s sincere. What I feel for you is insatiable and hysterical and overgrown, but it is honest.

For all my lies, for all my sins, my love is true.

It is real, and I mean it.

“Oh, I know, honey. Hush now, I’ve got you. You’re safe.”

For now, Ash’s cruel mind supplied, but he let the assurance pull the urgency from him, let Eiji slow the kissing down. Because Eiji always seemed to hear the things he couldn’t say, and he wasn’t frantic anymore. The taste of tears was gone from their mouths, and they breathed the calm in together.

“We still have tonight, don’t we?” Eiji asked, his forehead against Ash’s. “You’ll stay with me tonight?”

And Ash collapsed into his embrace, the adrenaline spent at last. “I will cry if you make me go any sooner than I have to.”

“You’re already crying, Aslan.”

“…I will cry some more. Do you want to make me cry?”

“Of course not, honey.”

---

Some things, Ash would give anything to forget.

The taste of bile. Gunshot recoil in his muscles. All those insinuations about taxidermy and stuffing.

But not this. Never this.

Bare bronze skin like a hearth against his own, sweeping touches like worship on his hipbone, butterfly kisses stinging the sunburns on his shoulders. Blanket and t-shirt and tank top all pooling round his feet, raindrop percussion in his ears. The smell of antiseptic, and gauze and plaster cast.

And underneath it all, flowers. Even still.

Ash smiled to himself, nuzzling into the scent.

Intractable. Vivid. Tender.

Eiji Okumura. Life on Earth, indeed.

Ash peeked up at him, readjusting his head to rest more comfortably on his shoulder. They were squished together on one side of the couch, every uninjured inch of Eiji claimed by Ash’s sprawl, his devouring gaze.

And oh, was he devouring.

The flex of Eiji’s arms, his downy hair, that brief little solar flare in his eyes when a laugh was startled out of him. The brush of his eyelashes, his painting-steady hands, that butter-rum-cinnamon cocktail his voice dipped into on every taunt.

“Only take what you can carry,” Max had said, when they were packing up.

Could he carry this with him, Ash wondered?

Would Eiji stay on his skin, in the cut of his cheekbones and in the scars from his first bike accident? Would he make a home in the taste of plums and sugar cookies, live in the melody of boiling water and whistle-songs, bright in the darknesses of Ash’s life?

Or would the weight of slaughter crush him out of Ash’s system, grind those remnants of softness so small Ash wouldn’t know how to recognize it anymore? Or worse, would Ash rip Eiji off his soul himself one day, resent Eiji for sanding down his edges so much that a creature like him so unworthy of love was now also incapable of the very violence that made him valuable?

“Hate me,” he whispered, unthinking until Eiji peered at him, oddly disoriented.

“What was that, honey?”

God, he looked half-bewitched.

Ash used to blossom under that look, used to feel like Jade: precious, lucky, invincible. But it did nothing but ache now, knowing he was walking away from Eiji. Every word was sawdust in his mouth.

“Why can’t you just hate me? It would make this so much easier.”

“Pfft. Ask me for another impossible,” Eiji snorted, like Ash was babbling incoherently and not deadly serious. “This one I couldn’t do even if you actually wanted it.”

Ash pouted, jabbed one finger emphatically into Eiji’s chest. “I do want it!”

But Eiji simply booped his nose with his own, then lay back on the pillows and closed his eyes. “Liar.”

Ash sighed, the petulance gone from him, the charge soaking through him like orange bitters and ink. Even now, even after everything, Eiji found a way to not make it hurt quite as bad.

He cuddled up to Eiji, relaxing as Eiji shifted to bring them even closer together. Ash drank him in, hoarded his heat, rose and fell with the rise and fall of his chest. Even this entwined, Ash couldn’t deny that he longed for him. Eiji’s hand was secure on his waist, and yet he felt like fine sand, slipping forlorn through Eiji’s fingers.

So acute was it, that it made him bold enough to voice the most selfish and soul-sad of his desires.

He tapped one insistent finger on Eiji’s cheek till his eyes opened, shining like dew.

“Mm? Did you think of something?”

“Let me be yours, Eiji. Give me your forever.”

Eiji regarded him dubiously, like he was trying to find a kind way to break it to him, and Ash’s heart grew brittle with every passing second of silence. Then Eiji pecked his trembling lips and said, “It’s already yours, you gorgeous twit. It was going to be even if you didn’t ask for it. Find yourself another impossible request.”

Suffice to say, it took a whole two minutes for Ash’s ears to stop ringing.

He didn’t know if he was ten-thousand-volt-shock irritated, or irresistibly enchanted that Eiji could just say stuff like that and then settle back down, eyes closed and face tilted into Ash’s hair like a sunflower in the sun.

“I can’t think of anything right now,” Ash said eventually, his own smile sneaking up on him.

“That’s alright,” Eiji laughed. “Hold on to it. Call it in when you know what you want. For now, ask for something possible. A going-away present.”

Ash raised an eyebrow, a little thrown. “A going-away present? For me?”

Eiji nodded to the cardboard box sitting on the shelf by the door. “You have one for me. I’d like to give you something too. To remember—”

“As if I could forget you,” Ash interrupted, reflexive.

Eiji pushed coyly at his chest. “Even so. I want to. Come on, Aslan, there must be something.”

Ash blushed something fierce, desert sunset all the way from the tips of his ears to the base of his sternum.

There was something.

Something that had swum on the fringes of Ash’s wishful thinking ever since Eiji had carved his likeness out of gold and champagne on a canvas with his fingers. But this wounded, Ash didn’t even know if he should—

“Ask, honey. You know I’d do anything for you.”

God, that voice. Lemonade laced with siren song and ichor; why did Ash think he’d last a second against it?

“I want a portrait; a p-painting,” he blurted. “Of you.”

Whatever Eiji had been expecting it clearly hadn’t been that, because he sounded absolutely ragged when he spoke next. “Of me?”

“A small one,” Ash elaborated, determined to voice this before his brain came back online. “Something I can carry in my pocket, you know? I—I want…a way to feel—to feel you close. Always.”

“God, you wound me, honey.” Eiji sounded so dazed, so hapless and vulnerable, but fuck, his smile made it brave, made it gentle and ardent and zealous all at once.

Ash nearly kissed it off him, just to see if there was ambrosia there.

“Come on then, help me up. We’re going to need supplies, and a mirror.”

---

Some things, Ash would fight to remember.

Griffin’s naptime lullabies. The breathless awe of his first nebula sighting. How to ride a bicycle.

And this. Especially this.

The first light of the day, bleeding periwinkle into Eiji’s living room. The rustling dance of his pet plants. The chill in the air, the bathroom mirror precariously propped up by old encyclopaedias, the coffee table so cluttered with bottles of dye and canvas scraps and blotting rags.

Eiji sitting between his legs, slumbering over what table remained, red splotches between his shoulder blades marking the spot where Ash’s face had rested, where he’d fallen asleep despite not wanting to miss a single moment.

Ruffled raven hair cascading over closed eyes, growing out, longer than it had ever been before. Plush lips, so much more obviously kiss-red in this light then they’d appeared last night. Dye-stained fingers, enduring colours— ‘Hawthorn Stem’, ‘Nightshade Berry’, ‘Chestnut Peel’—spider-webbing through every whorl, every fine line.

Ash felt his prickling eyes brim anew. Artist’s fingers, dozing content on a completed creation: a portrait small enough for a knapsack, a pocket; large enough to see dimples, how the jaw muscles pulled, how the eyes crinkled.

Eiji with a smile on his face.

Just like Ash had requested. Only…only there was something else too…

Ash shifted them, those optimist’s fingers, just so, just to release the portrait, to see it fully.

And there, he saw himself, peeking over Eiji’s shoulder, just as he had been while Eiji had been painting. Rendered exactly how he’d looked like in the mirror.

A mess of blonde, a furrowed brow, a half-open eye. Admiring and ardent, yearning and blissed-out in equal measure.

A green eye.

“I’ve never seen a green quite like the green of your eyes.”

Ash gasped, tempest in his throat, pressed the picture to his freight-train heart before it could leap from his grasp and run away. He picked up Eiji’s hand, brought it to his lips to kiss—

—And was promptly shocked numb.

Damn Eiji. Damn his lover’s fingers. There on the table, hidden under them, was a brand-new dye-swatch.

The exact green of Ash’s eyes. And next to it, in painstaking cursive, the shade name.

‘Aslan Jade’.

“How come my face isn’t in it?”

“I didn’t have the right green for your eyes. But I will make it one day.”

“Yeah? You think Shunichi will ever ask for that?”

“I won’t do it for Ibe-san. I’ll do it for myself.”

Oh, Eiji. He didn’t even know. Ash had never told him his whole given name.

In another life, he would have. He’d have told him everything, all his secrets. They’d be safe with Eiji.

He’d be safe with Eiji, in another life.

House on a hill. Roses in the garden.

Paintings on the walls, books on the sofa.

Plums in the fridge, tea in the kitchen, clothes on the floor.

A bed they never made, a distance they never knew, an asteroid that never arrived.

Oh well. No such luck in this one.

In this one, they were Altair and Vega. Ships in the night. Falling trees in a metaphorical forest with no one around to hear them.

God damn it all. Ash was supposed to have Glenreed luck. Better than the devil’s.

But—well, he wasn’t a Glenreed, was he? About time he stopped acting like he was. About time he came into his own, embraced what he’d always known he was, deep down.

Liar. Monster. Demon.

He disentangled himself from the blanket nest, retrieved his t-shirt from the floor, tucked the precious picture into his pocket. He texted Max, checked that Shunichi had arrived to drive them to the rendezvous point, confirmed that Shorter was already waiting for them there.

He looked around the room one last time. Ash could almost hear it, their laughter on the couch, the turning of pages as they did their homework, their hiccupping breaths from when they’d nearly kissed that time against the kitchen counter.

That dinky radio, that horrid hurricane, that shrill screech of bike wheels on potholed roads.

Life on Earth. Blazing colour, incessant noise. It had been so beautiful.

Eiji was still asleep, which was just as well. Ash didn’t want to see him open his present anyway. He placed the box near the coffee table, so it would be the first thing Eiji saw when he woke up. On top of it, he placed his rose-tinted Aviators.

“Bye, babe. Thanks for giving me a home.”

It took the last of Ash’s resolve to wrench himself away, to walk back to the door. He spared one more glance for that soft, soft hair, and then he was gone.

---

“Sorry.”

“The fuck? Why?”

“For breaking the promise.”

“Don’t die on me, brother.”

“You’re not dead, Ash.”

“Not that one. The other one.”

“Treat my boy Eiji real nice. You’ve got a good thing going with him. Don’t fuck it up.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

“Don’t worry about it? Thought you’d be a bit more pissed than that.”

“Like I said. You’re not dead. You’ve still got time to keep it.”

“Tell that to Golzine and the Lees and the entire central alliance. Twenty more hours and they’ll want all our heads on a stick.”

“Meh. High risk, high reward, right?”

“Don’t make me break this wrench over your cartoonishly bald head, Shorter. You’re flying this thing.”

“Who’re you calling a cartoon? I look regal. Classy!”

“Wow. No mirrors on the ship, are there?”

“You’re a pain in my ass, Lynx. Sucks that it had to be this way, but it’s good to have you back.”