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Kenshi was quiet, as he had been for days now.
He was still in recovery, still trying to recover from the overexertion, from the exhaustion he had been put through- the exhaustion he had and hadn't put himself through. It was always a bit of a gamble when he was in a possessed state of just who exactly was in control. For most of it, it wasn't him; it was someone else inside of his head, using his body, using his memories to figured out where to go- to figure out how to access and bypass things.
But sometimes, there could be a shift, a small glimpse of him amongst the chaos.
Just before he was pulled back under.
It was never easy.
Not for him, not for anyone.
At the very least, no one was hurt this time around.
Only him, to a moderate degree.
And her as well- but only minor.
As of right now, in his current state, Kenshi was beyond the point of being aggressive, or becoming aggressive, which made keeping an eye on him a little easier. But it always came back around to just how quiet he was, to just how quiet the aftermath of such a situation could make him. How he would be in an odd conscious, yet comatose state, completely blind to the world outside of his own head.
More blind than usual, anyways.
He wouldn't respond to anything or anyone, choosing instead to work things out in his head.
Or at least, that's how he had always described it to her.
And while Sonya knew that he would eventually come out on the other side, as he had done the times before, there was always that worry that this time would be different. That he would stay quiet for too long, that he wouldn't be able to snap himself out of it, that he would remain trapped inside of his own head like he was before.
But at least with before, when he was in the thralls of possession, there was always a reaction she could get out of him.
For now though, Sonya wouldn't press him for answers, for a response.
She knew he would come around when he wanted to, when he was ready to.
If she pushed him, if she showed outside force, Kenshi would just shut her out- and that was the last thing she needed.
He had always been quiet by nature anyways, so it wasn't too big of a change.
A habit, she figured, that he had learned from his past.
It wasn't uncommon for him to be looked over in a room full of people, despite how out of place he often looked.
Still.
This quiet was different.
And the silence was killing her.
As soon as he was safe to be released, safe to be outside of the confines of containment, she had brought him home with her. People always objected when she did, out of concern, but she never hesitated on the decision. It was better for him to be somewhere comfortable, even if he wasn't aware of his surroundings. Not to mention, it was easier for her to work from home and keep an eye on him here, rather than have to trek back and forth across the base in order to see him.
He was still quiet, but she filled in the dead air when she could.
She rambled on about her day, about updates going on around the base; she voiced her frustrations with emails and video calls.
She said anything and everything she could think of just to keep herself busy, just to keep the silence from suffocating the both of them.
But unlike some of the people that she worked with, she wasn't good at listening to herself talk.
If anything, she hated it.
She wanted engagement.
She wanted responses, counters, anything- all the things that Kenshi always gave her, whether she wanted them or not.
So sometimes, it ended with the both of them in silence, no matter how hard she tried.
At the very least, Sonya figured he would enjoy her company.
It was better than nothing, anyways.
"You should get some sleep."
The comment caught her as Sonya found herself dozing off, and was just barely loud enough to stir her back awake.
"I'm fine," she assured, half-convincing at that, as she straightened herself up from her slumped position on the couch. She moved a hand to rub at the back of her neck, feeling the slight pinch of a settling ache from where she must've had it at an angle. "I'm not tired."
"No, you're not," Kenshi agreed. "You're exhausted."
"I'm fine," Sonya reiterated, before she shifted back and found a more supportive, relaxed position.
She didn't know why she felt so compelled to argue such an obvious point.
But she did.
If Kenshi wanted to talk now, she wasn't going to waste it by falling asleep on him.
She looked over to where he was seated, to where he had been seated this whole time.
He hadn't moved much since she had brought him home.
Not outside of the occasional restless pacing anyways.
"You still got your smart mouth, so I take it that you're feeling better."
Sonya hoped, for once, that Kenshi would be reading her.
That he would figure out that she was just kidding.
And hopefully not throw her through the wall.
Again.
"I'm not... going to throw you through the wall," Kenshi spoke, providing her with the response she wanted, before he added, "- but I understand why you would think that."
"It was an off-the-wall thought," Sonya replied, "- unrelated to the first wall."
Kenshi didn't laugh, but she swore she caught a twitch on the corner of his lips.
Which was good enough for now.
"Are you okay?" she asked.
Sonya knew that it was a broad question, but it was worth asking.
The possibility of getting an answer was too much to pass up on.
"I'm just tired," he replied.
They both were, admittedly.
On both physical and mental levels.
And emotional, by this point.
There were a lot of emotions going on right now that neither of them were in any state to deal with.
"You should get some sleep," Sonya spoke, parroting his words from before.
"As should you," Kenshi reminded.
"Are we going to keep going around in this circle?"
"You could go through the wall," he offered.
"Not this time," she replied, and she found herself chuckling with the words.
Sonya looked him over once more, taking note of his slightly slumped back position now, which was a change from his hunched forward one. Without his blindfold on, it looked like he had aged a decade in a week's time, and she wasn't certain if he had always been that pale before. Kenshi had always looked out of place with his armor on, but she had gotten so used to the sight of it that he looked odder without it. And now, in this instance, he looked strangely small in civilian clothing.
He was showing his age, and for some reason, it scared her.
"Do you think this will be temporary or... are you finally coming out of it?" she asked.
"I don't know; I never really know," Kenshi answered.
No one did.
If anyone should know the answer, it should be him.
So if he didn't know, there was no hope for the rest of them in knowing either.
"You'll be fine," Sonya assured. "And even if this is temporary, you'll get there. You always do."
"And what if I don't?"
Maybe he had been reading her for longer than she thought.
He was parroting the same scenario she had questioned herself on.
"I don't know, it hasn't happened yet," she replied. "I guess I'll have to think of something if, or when, that time comes. Although hopefully, as I've said the times before, this won't happen again. But seeing as it keeps happening despite that, I'll need to start getting a better understanding of what exactly is going on, and why this happens in the first place."
Sonya knew his possessed state was related to Sento.
If Sento's blade took damage, beyond the normal, it could trigger the seals on it to break.
Which then triggered his ancestral spirits to break free and possess him.
But sometimes this wasn't related to Sento.
Sometimes if Kenshi himself took too much damage, or exceeded some kind of panic level, the seals would break as well.
Those were the two situations she had witnessed so far.
But sometimes, he got injured and it was fine.
Sometimes Sento got damaged and it was fine.
Sonya was still struggling to find a correlation, to find a link- to figure out just where the line was that caused the breaking point.
Every time it felt like she was close to making a connection, it seemed like something changed, or something didn't connect; and it made it difficult for her to understand what was going on, which then made it difficult to learn how to prevent it from happening again. It would be easier to put the pieces together if she could study Sento itself, but Kenshi was quick to put down any attempts to.
Which had always been a point of conflict between him and Raiden.
There was something special about that sword, beyond what everyone knew about it.
But it seemed like that secret would go to the grave with him.
Which was frustrating.
She just wanted to put a stop to whatever it was that he was going through.
But it just kept slipping out of her hand, out of her reach each time.
"You put up with a lot dealing with me," Kenshi noted.
"Well, that's because I know what it's like to have hundreds of voices yelling at you," Sonya replied.
And she got a quiet chuckle out of him this time.
"We should get some sleep," he offered.
"That we should."