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“That’s not what I meant!”
Lea’s fury burns red hot, literally; he can feel the flames licking at his tightly clenched fists.
“Calm down,” Isa hisses, yanking the collar of his hood over the little red blotch that had made Lea act so upset in the first place. “I was supposed to get close to him.” His face flushes a slight pink in the dark, nearly matching the hickey on his collarbone.
“Not that close!” Lea snaps back, shoving him. Isa nearly falls off the bed. “He’s like, a bajillion years old! What the hell were you thinking?”
“I’m trying to get him to trust me!”
“So you fuck him?!”
Isa’s face grows ever redder as he smacks a hand over Lea’s mouth. “Can you shut up ? And I didn’t fuck him!” Lea rips his hand away.
“So, what? Second base? Third base?”
“Lea !”
Lea kicks his legs out from under him and sits on the bed, the illusion of hurt crossing his face.
Isa rolls his eyes. “It’s not going to change anything,” he says firmly, perched delicately as always on the end of the bed. He presses a soft hand onto Lea’s knee.
Lea’s face scrunches up in disgust, and he pulls his leg away. “You think I’m still going to want to do anything? Knowing he touched you?”
Isa could have sworn he felt something then; something like a stab in the heart.
But that, of course, was impossible. He wishes he didn’t remember what it was like to feel heartache.
“Do you want to get out of here?” Isa watches Lea’s eyes move to the bed. “No, really, Lea. You want to get out?”
“Of course I fucking do,” he says through clenched teeth, green eyes snapping back up to meet Isa’s. “More than anything.”
“Then I’m going to do what I have to,” he says, voice breaking a bit. “It’s not because I want to, or anything.”
“Yeah, sure,” says Lea, kicking up his sheets and turning to face the wall. He still sounds pissed off. “Go to bed, Saïx .”
The next moment is like a flash: before either of them know it, Isa has Lea pinned against the wall. Chills run down Lea’s spine as he sees what looks like flecks of orange in Isa’s furious eyes.
“That’s not my name.”
“I’m sorry!” Lea yelps; his head is pounding where it smacked against the wall. “I didn’t mean it. I’m sorry.” Isa glares at him for another second before letting him go and turning away, the feeling of his fingers still burning into Lea’s skin. He zips up his coat and walks towards the door.
“Isa, really,” Lea gets up and follows him. “I’m sorry. Just.. please. Be careful. I don’t want him to hurt you.”
Lea has to watch him leave the room without another word. His hands are immediately engulfed in flames again as anger overtakes him. He takes a deep breath and watches the fire sink from his elbows to his wrists, still hungry for something to feed on. He manages to will them away despite the heat he feels in his fingertips.
With a long, drawn out sigh, he collapses back into his bed and stares at the ceiling, wondering if their plan to overthrow the Organization was a good idea after all.
—
Isa lays in bed a few nights later, the idea of sleep long forgotten. His wide eyes are glued to the wall and he feels like he hasn’t moved for hours. He blinks hard, just to make sure it’s not a dream. And sure enough, when he opens his eyes, he’s still stuck listening to the rise and fall of Xemnas’s empty chest, as if each breath is taunting him with what he’s done. He feels dirty, violated, but he shouldn’t; he gave himself up of his own free will.
He slowly sits up and kicks his legs over the side of the bed, finding himself aching in places he wishes he couldn’t identify. He searches the floor for his coat in the dark and slips it on. He doesn’t not bother to zip it as he summons a dark corridor. Hoping it’s quieter than opening the door, he steps inside, instantly transported to his room. He grabs a towel and finds his feet leading him to the bathroom.
The shower he takes is scalding, and he definitely stands in the water for longer than he actually bathes. It isn’t until the water runs cold that he starts to wonder how long he’s been in there. Not wanting to see anyone in the hallway, he portals himself to his room again, hair still dripping and towel around his waist.
He nearly jumps out of his skin when he sees Lea on his bed, having fallen asleep leaning against the wall. He must have heard the portal though, because his eyes suddenly open. Isa feels incredibly exposed, though he knows his bare torso is nothing new to Lea, who, predictably, is giving him bedroom eyes. It nearly makes him sick.
“Isa,” Lea murmurs, in a way he knows he would have found alluring in a life that feels like a million years ago. “Where have you been?” He gets up and makes his way over to Isa, stuck standing near the doorway without even realizing it. Isa jerks away from his touch before his hand can even make it to his skin.
“I’m tired tonight,” he says, because it’s obvious what Lea wants, as it’s all anyone seems to want from him. But maybe he said it a little too quickly, too guarded, because Lea’s forehead crinkles in the middle and his eyebrows meet.
“Was it Xemnas again?” He reaches to touch Isa again, but he just brushes past.
“Lower your voice.” He turns his back to Lea and changes into something to sleep in. He picks something comfortable because the aches suddenly come back full force, the warm comfort of the shower having worn off. He climbs into bed and turns on his side to face Lea again, grimacing as he tries to find a comfortable position. Lea watches him, eyes echoing something like sadness.
“Please just go,” he whispers, as Lea comes to sit near the end of his bed. “I want to go to sleep.”
Lea sighs, but he listens. He gets up and portals to his room without another word.
All Isa can do at that point is grab a pillow and curl in on himself. It’s a relief nobodies can’t cry. If only pain wasn’t the only thing they could still feel.
—
Isa awakens to chaos the next morning without even knowing it. Not long after he wakes up does he hear the ever-familiar sound of Lea’s raised voice, dripping with hatred and vitriol. He quickly gets dressed, preparing himself to break up a fight, but praying Lea wasn’t stupid enough to pick one with Xemnas.
He’s starting to make out words as he rushes down the hall, and catches the end of a sentence as he arrives at the Grey Area:
“...just leave him alone!”
His worst fears are realized as he sees Lea, stupid, overconfident Lea, fists bared and yelling at Xemnas. There’s a crowd; other members standing around, acting like they’re not watching.
“I don’t know what you want with him but stop hurting him!”
Xemnas looks almost amused by Lea’s outburst. He turns and catches Isa’s eye, giving him a smile just as he raises his hand to summon his weapon.
“No!”
Isa runs and manages to get there just in time for Xemnas’s ethereal blade to make contact with his forehead.
Twice.
He screams, the burn unlike any pain he’s ever felt before. His lungs feel raw when he stops, but he can’t keep his mouth from opening into another scream. He falls to his knees, hand pressed between his eyes. The only thing he feels besides pain is blood flooding between his fingers. He hears something, someone’s voice, but he hardly has any idea what it is. He can hardly think. He finally moves his shaking fingers from his head, blinking blood out of his eyes. His vision is hazy, and he can barely make out the figure in front of him, but he knows it’s Xemnas. He knows he’s smirking down at his work.
That’s his last thought before he passes out.
—
Isa was kidding himself if he thought he woke up in pain that morning, because what he was feeling now was unbearable.
He opens his eyes, which only makes the pain between them worse. Closing them again hurts too. He groans in pain, deciding that closed is better. He hears footsteps approaching and stiffens.
“It’s not Xemnas, Seven.”
Vexen’s voice surprises him, and while he’s glad it’s not Xemnas, the former isn’t much more of a relief.
“Nasty cut he gave you. You’re stitched up though. You’ll live.”
He searches for words but he doesn’t really know what to say. It feels like forever before something reaches his lips.
“Can I… see?”
Vexen makes a startled sound. “Would you like to? I don’t want you to pop the stitches.”
Something like fear is stirring in him, but he reaches his hand out anyway. Vexen hesitantly gives him a hand mirror.
Isa nearly drops it when he sees his reflection.
Any expression his face tries hurts, so he quickly gives it back. But that doesn’t stop the image from being burned into his mind: two deep lines sit between his eyes in a neat little X.
“It’s… permanent?” he swallows, already knowing the answer.
“Oh, certainly,” says Vexen, as nonchalantly as if he were talking about the weather. “It’s practically branded into your face. I’d ask you what you did, but I don’t really want to know.”
Isa just closes his eyes again, and winces when he closes them too tight. He feels tears of pain prick at his eyes, and feels ridiculously human.
“Number Eight has been asking to see you. I assume he had something to do with this.”
The words hit Isa like a train: this is Lea’s fault.
“I don’t want to see him.” He turns to face the wall.
“This is the third time he’s threatened me with arson so I’m going to let him in now that you’re awake. I won’t let him stay long.”
Isa knows the gesture is nothing out of compassion, just Vexen’s dislike of Lea. He says nothing when Lea bursts into the room.
“Shit Isa, are you okay?!” He rushes to his bedside. Isa doesn’t turn his gaze from the wall.
“Take it easy, Eight. You don’t need to aggravate the wound.” Vexen quietly exits, leaving the two of them alone. The last thing Isa wants.
“I’m sorry,” Lea says, voice shaking. “Isa, I’m so, so sorry.”
“Get out of here.”
“Isa, please —”
“And you’re sorry? I saved your life.”
“Well—thanks, I guess, but look, I was just trying to help you.”
“Maybe I don’t— shit!” He takes a deep breath and clutches the sheets of the bed tight as he feels the stitches tighten as if they’re ripping at the seams. “If I wanted your help, I would have asked for it.” He closes his eyes again, waiting for the pain to subside.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers again, unhelpfully.
“Lea,” says Isa, not holding anything back in his tone. “You’re the reason I have worry lines at seventeen. If there’s anyone I shouldn’t be talking to right now, it’s you. Leave.”
He winces at the pain between his eyes, but feels relief as familiar footsteps trail out of the room. He tries to relax his face as he closes his eyes, begging for sleep to take him anywhere but where he is now.
—
The next weeks seemed to blend together endlessly. Once his cuts were healed enough, he bounced from his own bed, to Xemnas’s, to Lea’s, but no matter where he was he never seemed to get enough sleep. There was no longer any comfort in sleeping with Lea, especially when they had sex; it just reminded him of the position he had put himself in, and how he had no way to get out of it. Lea tells him between the sheets, softly, that he’s his, but it doesn’t feel like it because Xemnas tells him the same thing.
It wasn’t long before the word started to get around either; he suspected it was Xigbar who had spread the rumor, since he was the one who christened Isa with the “lap dog” nickname. Everything else was in whispers no one bothered to say quietly enough when he was walking by. They made it sound like it was some kind of accomplishment. For Isa, it was just another burden.
He never bothered having real conversation anymore, just skipped the pleasantries and stripped off his coat, mentally unprepared for the exhaustion that would be following the coming hours. Once after a particularly long night, Xemnas had brushed the hair out of Isa’s eyes and run his thumb along the scars he’d left across his nose. The wound still felt fresh; Vexen had only removed the stitches two days ago, and he couldn’t help but wince when Xemnas touched it. Xemnas only smiled at him.
“I’m sorry I had to mar that beautiful face of yours, but I had to remind you of who you belonged to.”
He moved his finger down to Isa’s lips, quickly followed by his own. Isa had nothing to do but force himself to kiss him back, fearing any consequence beyond what’s already happened to him.
He stops sleeping with Lea, much to the other’s chagrin. It gets to a point where the two are hardly talking at all. When Isa tells him that Xemnas and work are enough for him to balance, he looks hurt. Isa wishes he would stop pretending to have feelings.
He wonders if this would be any different if he had a heart, but he can’t imagine anything more painful than what he’s already going through.