Chapter Text
The darkness swirls, settles, gathers at his feet, and he clasps the umbrella tightly to his chest. The rain tumbles down in sheets, his cloak soaked, but he refuses to open the umbrella. He watches the darkness in front of him. His eyes focus on nothing. The caverns above howl at him and hurl down their strongest weapons.
He waits.
The stillness behind him rips in two, and the darkness disappears, repulsed by the sliver of light that now appears. He turns, expressionless, because he already knows what is about to happen.
When the other man emerges from the light, he takes a step back. The action is mechanical and not a reaction. The new arrival glances up at the thundering sky, emerald green eyes narrowing, and sighs.
“I told you’d I’d come,” he says. His red hair hangs limply about his face, and his skin is shades lighter from illness and weariness. He notices the umbrella that he, in his soaked and torn cloak, holds, and smirks. “I hope you didn’t steal that.”
He says nothing. He thinks of white, of lab coats and gleaming cobblestones, of the spray of water dashing on the concrete borders of a fountain. Something sits on his chest, something makes its home on his ribs and eats at his heart. He stares at the darkness now pooling around his feet once more.
The red-haired man sighs. The cloak is gone and so are the once tell-tale purple marks. “Isa…”
Ah, yes. His name. Isa.
“Isa, I wanna give you time, but you know…” the other man gestures helplessly at the cloak Isa wears. Isa shivers, not from the chill of the rain, but from something far worse. His heart pounds, and with each beat, his stomach burns like acid. “I wanna give you time, but I gotta bring you in. You know that. You…”
Isa drops the umbrella next to him and steps forward. The darkness hisses at his heels, but Isa ignores the rain and the slinking shadows and takes hold of the other man’s shoulder. Bright green eyes meet him, surprise blossoming in their depths.
“Lea,” Isa whispers. His voice cracks, throat sore and tongue dry from disuse. His hearts hurts far more. “I want to go home.” Something in his chest hurts, hurts, hurts.
A moment passes. The rain continues to fall on the earth below their feet. Isa’s fingers tighten around Lea’s arm. Suddenly, Lea’s arms wrap around Isa’s back, slow and soft and tentatively, as if Isa is a snake about to strike.
Isa’s chest throbs, his ribs cracking. He is blind, but the world is full of color. Red is the color of the sunset, red is the color of blood, red is the color of…
“Let’s go home,” Lea murmurs. His hands slide to Isa’s shoulders, and a moment later, Isa feels the weight of his cloak slide to the ground. His arms hum with an energy he does not quite recognize.
Red is the color of the sunset. Red is the color of blood. Red is the color of…
The universe tears itself in two once more, the light opening upon a world of earth and darkness. Lea takes Isa’s wrist, red hair spitting water and revelation.
Isa dares not look back as he follows Lea into the light. The unknown.