A Mourning Reunion

Tucked into Jules, Seren’s tear-wracked chest shuddered for breath. It hurt. His lungs and his ribs and his scars and his heart and his throat and the space behind his nose and his eyes and his forehead. It all hurt, sharp and deep and tight and twisted up like a knife in a cape. Air. Not enough air. Too much fluid, all in the front of his face and none of it in his mouth or throat where he needed it, skin-cracking dry and raw like the air was sandpaper.

He wanted it to go away. He didn’t want it to stop. He wanted to run and hide from the guilt and the blame and the shame and the pain.

He didn’t deserve to escape the pain. Haiiro was dead and it was his fault.

His fault.

His fault...



Eventually, the worst of the tears slowed, simply from exhaustion rather than resolution. Seren hung across the chair arm in Jules’ embrace, wrung out and worn out and worse than trash, because trash had least been useful once. He was just left behind, left in the wake of the person who most deserved to live in all the world. The person he most needed to live. The person he had doomed to death, and been unable to save. As much his fault as if he had given the order. His fault.

He didn’t deserve this life. To go around like nothing had happened, like the world would go on, to sit and drink tea and take comfort in the arms of another. Seren pulled into himself as the salt began to dry on his cheeks, and with the strength of lately-unused core muscles he dragged himself back to the chair. He didn’t really make it upright, but rather fast hunched forward. He stiffly rubbed at his crusty face with a rain-damp shoulder, and then shivered. Now he was wet and cold and tired and aching. His sigh sent a sharper jab of pain into his chest. He deserved that. It was his fault.

When none of it went away, and the cold drifted deeper into his bones, Seren sighed again, even though it hurt. Jules deserved an explanation. They hadn’t asked for any of this mess. Seren had brought it in with him, unasked-for and unwanted. ”We were at-“ his voice creaked, but he swallowed against the dry swelling in his throat. ”We were at a bank. I was off duty. They - the bank was attacked. Some device that immobilized everyone.” A ragged breath, and then another. He deserved this pain. ”They found my work phone. Figured I’m - was - a hero. Took him so I wouldn’t try anything. I... I couldn’t do anything anyway. Nothing.”. His aura limply spread, a vague pink haze passing through table and chair and Jules without the slightest effect at all. Here and there, the occasional fleck of dust, dirt, and dried tear-salt glimmered. ”Nothing.”