Linx lay with Kiy tucked against his side, his large arm coming around to rest against the boy's side. Silent tears streamed down his face as a lifetime of memories flooded his mind. Some beautiful. Some heartbreaking. Some he saw now with more clarity than ever before. "Why didn't you ever tell me?" He didn't expect an answer. He didn't get one. "Fuck." His chest burned with everything he felt at that moment. Guilt along the top; though he wasn't sure why. He knew logically he had no reasoning behind that particular emotion. But there it was nonetheless. He wanted to scream. He wanted to rage. Instead, he silently allowed himself to release the pain. "Why didn't you trust me, Kiy? After all this time..." And that's what it boiled down to, isn't it? That ultimate pain he felt radiating throughout his being, pinging around like a pinball across his heart. A lifetime together and he didn't trust him. Linx sat up, untangling himself from Kiy's small frame. He felt Kiy stir behind him and sit up. His breath hitched as he felt hands running up his back to clasp his shoulders. Hands he remembered with such clarity, he closed his eyes against the sensations.
"It isn't that I didn't trust you, warrior," he said from behind him, his hands now sliding slowly down his arms. Linx let out a mournful sob, his head dropping; chin to chest.
"What else could it be? If not trust, what then?" His voice was no more than a shaky whisper, afraid that if he spoke too loudly Kiy would be gone.
"My own fear. My own shame."
"Fear of what, Kiy?" His voice was so tight it hurt to force the words from his throat. "Fear of my leaving you? Fear of being alone? Fear of what I might think?" He swallowed.
"I never blamed you, my warrior. Please, find me." The pressure of his hands were then suddenly gone and he knew then whatever it was that always appeared before him had also vanished.
Four weeks remained of the ninety-day deadline and Linx was beginning to feel the pressure of that approaching day. Zim and Maddox had been working tirelessly in their research to find something...anything to aid them in getting Kiy back. Linx dragged his hand over his face, turned, and looked at the boy who lay sleeping soundly. "Fuck," Linx said, his voice cracking, his vision blurring. He slipped from the room. Slipped from the house. And in the quiet of the night, mourned everything he thought he ever had.
"Linx?" Linx looked up at the sound of his name, stopping his process in bending wood for bows to hunt with.
"What is it, Kiy?" His mood had been sour all day and mostly everyone kept their distance from him. When the boy didn't answer, Linx glanced back up to see him biting his lower lip, tears running down his face. Upon seeing Kiy's distressed posture, Linx sighed lightly through his nose and gently set his tool and half-made bow down at his feet. He felt like a prick. He knew he had been acting like one, but today he didn't seem to be able to keep himself in check, his fears and emotions running rampant as his worry for Kiy, both man and child, amounted closer and closer to insurmountable. Linx reached for him like he'd done so many times before, and felt his heart break when the frightened child cried out and jumped backward. "Ah, Kiy." He dropped his hand and looked at him, his eyes showing a pain that was clear to Kiy, no matter how confusing it may be to him. "I'd never hurt you."
Through his sobs, he asked, "Why are you so mad at me then?"
Linx swallowed hard around the knot in his throat. "I'm not mad at you."
"Yes, huh," he accused. "Y-you've been mad all day. Y-you yelled at me." This last bit was said with such betrayal Linx felt it soul deep.
"I'm sorry, Kiy." He dropped his head in his hands and took a deep breath. "None of this is your fault. And I'm really sorry I've been such an asshole to you today."
Kiy sniffled taking a shaky breath. "Do you still love me?"
The question felt like he'd been gutted and he couldn't stop his eyes watering upon its asking. "Kiy..." He paused squeezing his eyes closed, keeping his face obfuscated from Kiy's view. "Nothing will ever stop my loving you." He looked up then, his eyes misted over, his cheeks wet. "Nothing. There's nothing you can do or say or...not say...nothing will ever make me stop loving you." Kiy moved toward him, wrapping his arms so tightly around Linx's neck Linx had a hard time breathing. But he didn't push him back. He didn't say a word. He just hugged the boy back with equal fervor. When Kiy finally moved back, though not completely out of Linx's embrace, Linx asked, "Do you understand what that means, Kiy? Do you understand what I mean when I say that nothing will ever make me not love you?"
Kiy bit his lip, his eyes filling, and shook his head. "It means," Linx began with a soft voice, his hand pressed against Kiy's chest, "that no matter how bad of a day I'm having, or how mad at you or otherwise I may get, or how sad...no matter what you may do, or say, not say, fear, no matter what's happened to you in the past...there are zero conditions in my love for you." He didn't know if he was getting through to the man trapped inside the child he used to be, but he sure hoped so. He looked into Kiy's piercing violet eyes, the same eyes he'd looked into most of his life. "I'm sorry, Kiy. I'm sorry I've been like this today. It isn't your fault and I shouldn't have taken it out on you." Linx dropped his head into his palm, running his hands down his face. Everything was so fucked up. "Kiy..." Linx grabbed hold of Kiy's upper arms, gently squeezing and met his eyes. "Can't you feel I love you?" Linx searched his eyes, but they were too well hidden for him to properly read.
"Yes. But I feel other things, too. Things I don't understand. Things that scare me. I just don't want you to be mad at me."
"I'm not mad at you, little one." He sighed. "I'm...a lot of things right now, but mad at you isn't among them."
"Promise?"
He nodded. "I promise."
"Linx?" Kiy took a step closer to him. "Why are you so sad today?"
He shook his head and closed his eyes. "I just am, little one." He couldn't get into this conversation with him.
"But why?"
"Kiy..." He looked down at his feet, seeing the two smaller feet between his. Fuck, he felt wretched. With Kiy's birthday quickly approaching and the deadline on its heels, Linx felt as if anvil after anvil was being stacked neatly atop his chest.
"I don't understand," he said his voice becoming whiney with frustration and tears. "You never feel this sad until you look at me." Hanging his head, he turned and walked away, going back inside the cabin.
Linx didn't move. He didn't look up. He simply breathed. And that was a feat within itself.
Kiy walked into the cabin and over to Maddox, quietly sobbing as he reached for her. "Kiy, baby, what's the matter?" She rocked him slightly, running her hand up and down his back. He didn't answer clinging desperately to her, burying his face against the inside of her shoulder. She glanced at the pot cooking in the fire and then over to Zim, who had been busy writing down pertinent information that had been discovered over the last weeks about how to...correct...Kiy's current condition. He nodded with a gentle smile that he'd watch the food while she calmed down the child.
"I don't understand why I make Linx so sad all the time. He's always sad, but...he is more sad when he looks at me and I don't understand what I did to make him so sad. And he won't tell me. And he's mad...he says not at me, but he won't hardly look at me and he doesn't want me around today."
Maddox frowned. "Did he tell you that?"
"No. I just feel it. When I'm there, it makes him sadder." He sniffled. "I don't understand why and he won't tell me."
Maddox wiped away his crocodile tears and sighed lightly. "He just misses Kiy, little one. He misses him very much and I think he is beginning to believe that he may not be able to find him. And I think that scares him."
"He yelled at me today." The pout in his tone and facial expression almost made Maddox smile.
"He yelled at me too, baby." She thought for a moment, wondering if she should say what was on the tip of her tongue. She sighed as she watched more tears fall. "He also knows you're scared of him. Maybe not all the time. But he knows what you're expecting and scared of him doing on your birthday. And that really upsets him." She paused before continuing with, "When we were kids, they put Linx and Kiy in a room together to do just that...and he refused. Our friend was scared and cried and screamed, and Linx eventually calmed him down and held him through his fears. After that, he protected him more than he did before. What happened to you happened to our friend. And Linx did everything he could to make him feel safe and loved. He's protected him with his name. With his body. With his blood. He wouldn't do any less for you." Kiy wouldn't look at her, but he leaned in toward her, resting his head on her shoulder. She wrapped her arms more securely around him. "He would never hurt you. And he would never tell you that your fear of him doing that to you affects him greatly."
He was silent for a moment before, "When I first got here, Linx gave me his last name. If I bring it up to him do you think he will talk to me about it?" His voice was thoughtful.
"I don't know, baby. Maybe you should try."
"What if he yells at me again?" He sniffled.
"That's something you'll have to decide is worth the risk, my sweet."
Kiy made his way into the main room after washing up in the washbasin they kept in the back of the cabin. Whatever they had been discussing died into nothing as they watched him approach. Linx's features softened when Kiy stopped next to him, asking with begging eyes if he could be held. Kiy felt Linx's emotions shift around as he pulled the boy into his lap. Kiy burrowed his face into Linx's chest, his little fists gathering up the material of his shirt. Linx wrapped his strong arms around Kiy's small, fragile frame and kissed his forehead. Neither of them spoke. No one spoke, in fact, for quite some time.
"Hey, little one," Linx whispered softly as he kissed his forehead again. "I'm sorry about today, Kiy. I really wasn't trying to snap on you. And I'm really not mad at you." Linx whispered this close to his ear as if divulging a great secret only meant for him. Kiy sniffled and nodded but didn't comment.
"Will you come lay with me? I don't wanna be by myself." He didn't look up or even open his eyes as he made this request. He knew the others were watching but he paid them no mind.
"If that's what you want, little one." Kiy took comfort in his tone, the soft, sad undertones and all. He nodded, his hair tickling Linx's nose.
Maddox watched them with a heavy heart. With all the information they had gathered, no matter how prudent it may have seemed, was all for naught. Maddox knew that the only information that they really needed to know was buried deep within the tiny bundle Linx cradled in his arms. Her eyes watered as Linx's lips tipped upward the slightest bit, the barest hint of a smile. She thought back on what Linx had shared with her a couple of nights ago.
She admitted then that their trips to the cave were pointless. They'd learned all they were going to learn about this goddess and her curse. Thinking about it, she only kept going back to make herself feel useful. To feel like she was doing something to help her friends. Her family. Looking at them now she knew that if she lost them she would never recover. She looked away not wanting either of them to see the emotions displayed across her face. She caught Zim's eye and she knew he knew what she was thinking. The worry in his gaze broke her heart further. She closed her eyes against them all.
Zim looked back to Linx, their eyes meeting. Without a word passing between them, they had an in-depth conversation and, with his charge, Linx stood and went to his and Kiy's shared quarters.
Zim watched them leave, waiting a good, solid minute before looking over to Maddox, who still had her face turned away and her eyes closed. Over the last several months Zim kept a close eye on his partner. Watching her shove everything aside to take care of Linx when Kiy was missing. And now watching her try and take care of them both. He saw the emotional toll it was having on her and it was time for him to speak his mind. "Maddi," he said in a gentle whisper, his hand going to her back. Her eyes opened, meeting his in acknowledgment. "Walk with me." He stood and silently she followed suit, following his lead outside and away from the cabin. They had yet to wander too far from home in the dark, not yet having done much recon outside their immediate area for what might linger within the nighttime hours. "Talk to me." They were a good distance from the cabin, but within hearing distance, if Linx called, neither having their comms. Zim watched as a tear rolled its way down her cheek before reaching out to wipe it away. He waited silently for her to speak, not wanting to pressure her too much, too quickly. It would only make her more silent.
"He told me," she began in such a quiet tone he strained to hear. "He told me what he thinks Kiy has been afraid of all these years."
Linx lay next to the boy, his body rigid, his mind on overdrive. Kiy watched him under the pretense of having fallen asleep. He took the moment to watch Linx's face. To feel the unguarded emotions and try to better understand them. The freshest pain was a deep one. It stung and tasted bitter even secondhand. Betrayal. He analyzed it further, knowing instinctually that it wasn't directed at him.
He took a silent breath as a pang twisted his heart. His eyes, which had wandered while in thought, snapped back up to Linx's face. His eyes were screwed shut, his face marred with a pain Kiy didn't understand. Slowly he brought his little hand to grip tightly to Linx's larger one, which rested upon a toned stomach. Linx didn't speak, simply returning the hold. He had been thinking about what
Maddox had said about opening up to the boy in hopes the boy would open up in return. It was her hope as well as Linx's now, that this would help reveal what he already knew. He just needed it confirmed. Kiy needed to say it. He'd been contemplating ways to get this secret in the open but wasn't sure how. He didn't expect this smaller version to be any less stubborn; especially having first-hand knowledge of how stubborn he had always been.
"I don't mean to make you sad," Kiy finally said. He'd kept contact, which always helps him feel another emotions better. And he could feel this sadness went soul deep.
"You-"
"Yes, I do," he countered. "And I think I understand." Kiy sat up to meet Linx's eyes. Linx didn't move except his eyes to follow the boy's path to a sitting position. "I've been thinking about things a lot lately. How I got here," he said looking around. "How this all came to be." He paused a moment before, "I'm him, aren't I? I'm your Kiy. Only...little." He studied him a moment, waiting for Linx to deny this claim, but it never came. "And that's why you're so sad all the time. Because...even though he's gone...he isn't completely. And you see everything he was when you look at me. Everything he became once I grow up. Linx, what happened when I turned eight? The first time..."
Linx sighed. "They put us in a room separate from everyone. The building was empty, save us. They told me what to do before they opened the door and shoved me in. You were already there." Please, Linx, don't hurt me! "You were so scared. I'd seen you scared. But never before of me. I spent a majority of the night trying to calm you down. Convincing you that I'd never hurt you like that."
"So what they said is true?" he asked with fear in his voice.
"No. Not entirely. This was a... Well...I found out later that it wasn't SOP to perform that ritual until much later." Linx glanced at the boy and sighed. He hoped that by telling the boy whatever he told him during the duration of the conversation, would somehow help him solve this puzzle. "And it wasn't something that was...forced...I honestly don't know why it was different with us."
"But you didn't?" Kiy was looking at Linx's hands as his small fingers fidgeted with his larger ones.
"No. I never forced anything. In our lives he always had control." Linx sighed again scraping his hands over his head and down his face.
"What's it like to be in love, Linx?" Kiy asked with curious eyes.
Linx smiled, his chest lightening from the weight he'd felt bearing down on him. "It's beautiful. There's a connection there that's unique between the two people. They become the other half of your soul. And without them, you're lost." The weight was back in full force as the depth of his words was laid out.
"Are you lost, Linx?"
"Yes. Yes, I am. My heart breaks every day without him at my side." Linx struggled to keep his voice steady, but Kiy heard the slight wavering anyway.
He looked away as he said, "Is that why I make you sad? Because I'm here instead?"
Linx looked at those piercing blue eyes a moment before shaking his head. "Let me explain something to you, if I may?" At Kiy's nod, he continued. "I can't say I don't miss him. That his absence doesn't deeply affect me...but Kiy..." He waited until those blue eyes once more met his. "I love you. My love for you and he are very different...you and he are even different to an extent...but it doesn't lessen my love for you. It doesn't mean that if I get him back that I won't miss you. That I won't think about you and wondering where you are and how you're doing. I'll be very sad when... Either way, it turns out, Kiy, I'm losing someone I love. And that will make me sad.
"But you being here doesn't make me sad. You don't make me sad." He pulled his lips in before closing his eyes and saying, "You being afraid of me, being afraid I will hurt you like they did...while I understand why you're scared, that makes me sad. It makes me sad because I love you, little one. And I'd never lay a hand on you."
"Fuck, Maddox. That's...you think that's the reason?" Zim asked. They sat in the middle of the path they were on, far away from any plant life that might try to abscond with one or both of them. Zim looked at her, her gaze focused on the sky.
"Given everything, I'd say that it's a likely explanation. We've both seen how he gets on his birthday. Especially toward Linx. He hides himself away. When he is around, he doesn't let anyone touch him."
"He lets you touch him. On that day, you're his protection," Zimmer interrupted. "I knew some about Kiy's childhood. I overheard them when we were kids a couple times. When Kiy would have a nightmare. Sometimes I woke up, but Linx was always quicker than I about getting to him. I laid still then. When they began to talk. I tried not to listen, but..." He shrugged as he trailed off.
Maddox didn't respond, her eyes searching an unknown star system. Searching for answers she'd never find there.
"I don't mean to make you sad, Linx. And before you tell me again I don't, no matter how you phrase it, I make you sad. Maybe not all the time and not on purpose...but the things I'm afraid of...what they told me you as my leader would do... It's not so much you I'm afraid of. But the idea that you would do what they said." He took a shuddering breath.
"What did they tell you, Kiy?" It's something he'd asked his partner many times over the years and never received an answer. He didn't expect one now, and as the silence stretched between them, he knew he wouldn't receive one.
Linx didn't press for an answer, knowing this wasn't a battle he'd win if he pushed. Kiy curled his small body tightly against Linx's side, his face buried against Linx's ribcage as his strong arm came around him. Long, arduous moments later Kiy finally began to tell Linx the secret he'd wanted to know most of his life.