Chapter 20: Medichi – (2)
Medichi's face was strained, his jaw clenched, trying to hold something in. His hands clamped over his mouth. It was barely enough to muffle the word coming out of his mouth, turning it into incoherent noises.
His heart was filled with reluctance. It hammered against his ribs in a frantic motion of panic and guilt. Even though he knew his father would not strike him, his mind refused to keep saying things he had just said. Not only for his father's sake. But his mother's. She had sacrificed herself to protect both him and his father.
Medichi looked at his father with a sorrowful expression. He wanted to say he was sorry. But he knew if he tried to speak, more venom would come out instead and would end up hurting his father even more.
Bloodweave looked at his son, the strained expression visible on his face. Despite his anger and sadness in his heart, he pushed it down and asked, "Is that your flaw? Med."
Medichi nodded his head.
Watching his son physically restrain himself, Bloodweave exhaled a long breath and said, "Clean up. Meet me in my office." Without waiting for a response, he turned and left.
He wanted to talk properly to his son, regardless of his flaw. He had genuinely wanted to sit down and understand his son. But hearing about his wife, the love of his life, the woman he could not protect. He could not help but feel the sadness and self-loathing creep up. Those words had reopened old wounds that had taken a long time to heal.
Bloodweave walked along the corridor, in a daze, his mind elsewhere entirely.
When he reached his office and entered the room, the door clicked shut behind him. He walked towards his table and sat at his desk, then looked at the framed photograph that sat on top.
He reached out to the framed photograph. It was of a woman holding a child, smiling, while the child had a blank look, as if he did not understand what was going on. He reached towards it and looked at the woman more intensely.
Bloodweave looked at the smiling woman in the photograph for a while. His emotions rose looking at her. That brought memories of his failure as a husband.
'You could have raised our son better than me, right?'
'Around me, he seems to…" he paused, searching for the right word, then sighed and continued, "I don't know?"
"Have I been too harsh on him?"
"But my only wish is for him to be strong."
"You understand that, right?" He said, looking at the photo, tracing its edge.
"In this world, weakness is a sin." He said, stroking the woman's face.
"I understood that the day I lose you. So I tried my best to be strong and make him strong."
He stopped talking to himself and continued looking longingly at the woman. The way he always did when the office was empty and no one could see him do it.
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Medichi watched his father leave the room. The moment the door shut, the pressure he'd been holding vanished instantly. Like a held breath finally released. He got out of the pod and went for a bath as instructed.
Guilt sat heavy in his chest the entire time. He knew exactly how much his father had loved his mother — a woman he himself couldn't even remember, but whose sacrifice he understood completely. Hearing himself drag her into something so ugly made his stomach turn.
As the water ran over him, his mind kept circling back to his father's face. He remembered his father's expression, a flash of anger that was restrained almost instantly. He remembered the look on his father's face, the look of relief; it was the first time he had seen his father make such a face.
It unsettled him more than the anger would have. Seeing something so vulnerable in a man like his father felt wrong somehow, like glimpsing something he wasn't supposed to see. He tried to recall a single other instance of it. He couldn't find one.
After he dried off and dressed, he made his way to his father's office, rehearsing what to say along the way.
"If he knelt and kept quiet, perhaps Father would overlook it. Right?" He murmured.
"He might not scold me if I do that."
His chest tightened the closer he got. He'd always felt like he was falling short of his father's expectations. There was always a look he made that seemed like he was disappointed in him, no matter how much progress he made or how much he improved. That made Medichi nervous around his father.
Medichi knocked on the door at the office. A voice answered, " Come in."
He stepped inside as told. Medichi noticed his flaw stir up. He clamped his mouth shut on instinct, the pressure building behind his teeth, and knelt in front of his father.
Bloodweave was looking at documents; he was the Saint who looked over the trade in the waking world. Documents lay scattered across the desk, trade reports from the waking world awaiting his attention.
He looked up and saw his son kneeling before him.
He studied the sight for a long moment.
'Is our relationship really this shallow?'
'I spent time with him; he should be more comfortable.'
'Have I been too harsh?'
Bloodweave thinned his lip, looking at the sight.
"You don't need to kneel, Med. Get up"
"I am not angry," a pause, then he continued, "You said what you said because of your flaw."
Medichi looked up at his father. His father's mouth hadn't moved, but something in the set of his shoulders had eased — barely. A normal person would have missed it entirely. Medichi didn't. His senses caught the shift before his mind even registered what it meant, and a half-second later [Conspirer] supplied the answer: relief, carefully buried under a stern face.
Medichi still clamped his mouth shut. Bloodweave saw this and said, "I am not a child, Medichi. Remove your hands and tell me how your first nightmare went."
Medichi shook his head, refusing; only he knew the profanities that spoke as loudly as possible inside his mind. The profanity screamed louder and louder, words he had no intention of letting out — especially not in front of his father, of all people.
Bloodweave watched Medichi's head sway from side to side in silent refusal. "I will not get angry, Med." "I am your father. Why will I be angry at something that you cannot control?"
Medichi looked at his father's expression. Though his face looked stern, the sincerity underneath it was unmistakable.
That sincerity loosened something in his chest — and that was the mistake. The moment his guard slipped, so did his focus.
A voice slipped past his lips before he could stop it. "Pussyless bitc—"
Medichi clamped his mouth shut immediately before he could continue.
Bloodweave heard that, and his eyes widened a bit. But he did not feel angry. He instead felt disappointed. Not on Medichi but on himself. 'Was I really that bad, Med, that you feel this much restraint even after my reassurance?'
He looked at his son. At Medichi's low confidence.
At that moment, Bloodweave made up his mind that he would not let his son be a part of the upcoming war, whatever the price. He will keep him safe no matter what.
...........
A/N: I was not able to upload quicker because I was busy. I had to attend my college program and Church youth duties. Please comment and review. Rate the chap. Constructive criticism is welcome.