"Cities, Damien.Small ones.Just… going silent."
Sooha's voice was low, almost swallowed by the still air.He didn't look at Damien.Didn't have to.The sterile penthouse, so far above the city noise, made the words heavier.
"I overheard it," he went on, "from commanders talking while I was drawing their blood."
Damien stood near the couch, arms folded, the faint glint of Sooha's old gifts hidden in the shelves behind him."Did they send anyone to investigate?"
"Yeah."Sooha's gaze narrowed."The people Luke and I were supposed to pick up, before we swerved off that road."
"So you know nothing?"
"No."He shifted his weight, shoulders tense."That's why I came to you. I thought maybe you'd heard."
"We don't keep contact with minor sites," Damien cut in.
Sooha frowned. "Why?"
Damien's tone cooled."Why would a country care about villages in other countries?"
Sooha bit back the first sharp thing that came to mind.He hated it when Damien was right.But Damien had been out there when the accident happened.He'd known something was wrong.Even if he wouldn't admit it.
After a pause, Damien asked, "Do you think we should send a team to investigate? We could probably deal with it."
"It's not my call. But it does worry me."The memory of the commanders' tight voices gnawed at him.
Damien glanced toward the window, where Elysium's skyline glimmered cold and still."I don't mind forming a scout party… Do you know the locations?"
"I do."
They went over routes together.
The kind of people he should send, and so on, with Sooha enthusiastically brainstorming the ideas
Damien's face relaxed, and a faint smile was present.
But then Sooha asked quietly, "Will you go?"
Damien scoffed. "I'm not sending my people out there without me."
"Can I come?"
His head snapped toward Sooha."What? Of course not. It's dangerous."
"I've known danger my whole life, Damien."
Damien's voice sharpened."No way am I taking an untrained liability into the field."
"You don't get to call me that."
Sooha's eyes narrowed.
"I do. And you're not going."
Damien got up from the coffee table they were sitting at, his decision final.
But the words hit like a slap.Something in Sooha snapped.
Pink glow flared within Sooha as the air crackled.Out of thin air formed a barrier that flung Damien across the room.
He winced as he slammed into the wall beside an academy portrait, the frame rattling hard.
"I am going with you."Sooha's voice vibrated with the same force that had thrown him.
Damien rubbed his shoulder, wincing."Do you see yourself? That behavior isn't made for the battlefield."
The anger drained from Sooha's face.He stepped forward, panic breaking through.
"Let me fix it."
And then he froze.He'd just assaulted the High Marshal.In Elysium, that meant one thing.Death.
But then—
A chuckle."...You're impossible."
Sooha blinked. "What?"
"Don't make me regret letting you come," Damien said, lowering himself onto a leather chair he landed by and glanced over to Sooha.That look he gave him, quiet, cutting, sent a shiver down his spine.
Before he could think better of it, Sooha moved closer
And like an instinct he could not resist, an animalistic urge crept up on him.
His eyes glowed a faint rose color as his hands hovered over Damien's shoulder.
Damien's breath caught.A sigh slipped out; low, almost relieved.It had been ten years since he felt this warmth.Ten years since Sooha's healing touch.And he'd thought about it every single day.
It felt like lying down in silk after a long day, the warmth seeping deep into his skin as the pain ebbed.And somewhere, beneath the guilt, another feeling loosened its grip.The regret of letting Luke die.Because it had led to this very moment.
And shamefully,he had always wanted it to.
"So you can heal again?" Damien asked quietly, breaking the silence.
Sooha's cheeks flushed. The realisation hit. Maybe he didn't hate Damien as much as he told himself.
His throat tightened. He dropped to his knees beside the armchair.Tears slipped down.
And Damien brushed them away before pulling him into a tight embrace.
"Just tell me why you did it," Sooha whispered, eyes wet, looking up at him.
Damien's gaze softened.
"I felt crushed when I saw you with a stranger. After all those years, it felt like a knife to my chest." Damien shook his head in disbelief.
"And him being an enemy... it only made it easier to stop you from saving him."
His voice then dropped lower.
"But the terror in your eyes as he was dying...I see it every night."
Damien looked away."And I couldn't leave you there.I couldn't go on without taking you in."
He looked him in the eyes and said softly.
"Sooha.
I truly am sorry."
Sooha's chest ached.His breath came ragged.The words swirled like mist in his head.
After a long silence, he murmured,"That wasn't your choice to make."
He buried his face in Damien's chest, arms tightening around.
"Not your choice," he whispered again, voice breaking into quiet sobs as his breath laboured.
But then a scent hit him — sharp, clean, painfully familiar.He froze. His stomach turned before he even placed it.The same bodywash he'd used in Elysium.The same scent Damien always complimented whenever he stayed over..
Not a coincidence. Not after all these years.
He stayed still, as if more movement would make the thought louder.Then the rest began to fall into place.
The way Damien cleaned every room he entered.The peonies by the window.The TARTS book on the shelf.A picture frame turned face-down.And the earlier his voice admitting he let Luke die, not because he was an enemy, but because of him.
He's insane, Sooha thought, the tears now for show.
He pushed himself away, enough to meet Damien's eyes. "I think I should head home."
"I don't think going home is possible now," Damien replied.