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i
Rudo wakes with such violent suddenness that he pitches face-first out of bed, barely missing the heap of scavenged scraps gathered from his dives through the trash. The blankets have twisted themselves tight around his shaking body. His nose throbs where it struck the floor, and he clings to the small, bright pain rather than the nightmare still crouched waiting behind his eyes whenever he dares to blink.
It is not the first nightmare to wrench him from sleep. Rest has never come gently to Rudo. Again and again, the dark gives him Regto bloodied and dying, begging him to run, while the faces of the Sphere residents blur into hollow, accusing shapes that scream murder until the word seems to split the air apart.
Sometimes the dreams narrow themselves to his hands, to the scars his parents left there, throbbing with a pain so fierce, it feels alive. In sleep, they seem to spread beneath his skin, burning outward from the bone, a cruel echo of the rage he keeps so deep it nearly devours him.
He wakes gasping, throat clenched and body rigid, suspended for one awful instant between the endless abyss of the dream and the narrow safety of his bed at the Cleaners headquarters.
He forces his eyes to remain open until they sting and blur, then scrubs at them hard as he drags the blankets free from his legs.
Not again.
His hands ache in the confines of 3R from how tightly he had clenched them. He thinks he is still trembling, though perhaps that is only the small, trapped sound he is holding behind his teeth.
Rudo hates nightmares.
He makes himself breathe slowly, trying to steady the riot of his pulse, just as Enjin had taught him after that ruined mission in the north sector, when panic had seized him while they fled smugglers and Raiders through streets crusted white with snow.
He thinks of Enjin first – of broad grins and booming laughter, of the easy way he kneels beside Rudo to dig through trash as though it were the most natural thing in the world.
He thinks of Zanka, stern and watchful, guiding him through 3R with a patience Rudo still cannot quite believe he deserves. Then Riyo comes to mind, all dry wit and quiet amusement, laughing at terrible jokes while teaching him card games and warning him, with absolute seriousness, never to play against Enjin.
He thinks of Gris and the steadiness of his kindness, then of Follo – the supporter and now Giver, awkward and earnest, learning at last how to inhabit his own skin without flinching. Their fragile friendship has been unfolding little by little in the small spaces between missions, over shared meals and training sessions, until it has become something real.
He thinks of Tomme and the gentleness of her hands when she patches him back together, and of the other Cleaners, anything, anyone, so long as the thoughts are solid enough to keep the things in his dreams from slipping after him into waking.
He swallows and lets out the smallest whimper at the raw dryness in his mouth and throat.
He needs water.
So, he rises and makes for the kitchen, intent on a glass of water and, if luck is with him, something sweet scavenged from the pantry shelves.
The corridor is long and hushed. When he reaches the kitchen door and lifts a hand towards the handle, he hears movement inside and goes still.
Shit.
He had not expected anyone else to be awake at this time of night, and he didn’t want to explain to someone why he was awake just because his brain wouldn’t cooperate and let him sleep.
He doesn’t want to have someone ask if he’s okay, so he can lie and say he’s fine. He doesn’t want that awkward moment where they see through his lies, and they must stew in an uncomfortable silence, because there is no way in Hell is he telling anyone about his latest nightmares.
There is more shuffling beyond the door, and then the muted approach of footsteps. The door opens. First long legs, then tattoos, then pale blond hair, and finally the familiar golden irises of his team leader’s eyes.
Of course, it is Enjin.
The tattooed man barely seems to sleep at all. He drifts through the HQ at impossible hours, as though the night itself has made room for him.
Enjin’s eyes widen slightly, and for a long moment, he only stands there, framed in the doorway, taking in Rudo’s pale face and the too-quick rise and fall of his breath. Rudo looks back at him without expression, then slips past the breadth of Enjin’s frame and into the kitchen for water.
He fills a glass and drinks it down, shivering as the cold settles low in his stomach. When he turns towards the pantry, hoping for something to eat, he startles to find Enjin still leaning in the doorway, still watching.
Neither of them speaks. The silence lengthens, taut and oddly gentle, until Enjin finally asks in a low voice, “Can’t sleep?”
Rudo nods once, slow and reluctant. “I was thirsty,” he mutters. “Came to see if there were any of those shitty protein bars left.”
Enjin’s mouth tilts at one corner. “C’mon. I know you hate those, and in my infinite kindness,” he presses a tattooed hand to his chest in a gesture of mock grandeur, “I’ll split this with you.” He tips his head towards the sandwich balanced on the plate in his hand.
Only then does Rudo truly notice it. The sandwich is enormous, layered thick with meat and cheese and the hated green leaves he has already learned to endure eating.
Before Rudo can protest, a broad hand settles at his waist and the small of his back, guiding him gently down the corridor. The warmth of it is steady, almost startlingly kind, and he feels an odd little pang when it slips away so Enjin can open his bedroom door.
Rudo bristles on instinct, but curiosity overtakes him all the same as he steps inside and lets his gaze wander across Enjin’s unexpectedly chaotic room.
The walls are plastered with glossy, brightly coloured posters of the idol Too Lily, a startling contrast to Enjin’s rough edges that makes Rudo blink. Then his attention drifts to the desk, crowded with little trinkets, scraps of jewellery, and framed candid photographs of the other Cleaners caught in mid-laughter and shenanigans.
Unable to help himself, Rudo steps closer. In one photo, a younger Enjin and Zanka are grinning outside HQ. A few stray red hairs caught at the edge of the frame make Rudo suspect Riyo was the one behind the camera.
Another shows Enjin, Gris, and Semiu in a bar: Semiu wearing a smug little grin as she raises an empty glass, Enjin collapsed forward with his head on the table, and Gris staring blankly into the distance with a flush in his cheeks. Smaller photos crowd around it – Eishia and August in matching festival clothes, both smiling so brightly it almost glows; Follo, shyly flashing a peace sign beside Gris and Tomme, with ‘Follo’s first mission’ written neatly beneath it.
There is a sneaky snapshot of Rudo, sitting with Team Child while they draw, and finally a photo in a metal frame that he remembers dragging out of the trash and fixing a few weeks ago. It is the one Riyo took in the infirmary, after he and Follo made peace and, somehow, became friends.
That one sits near the front; its metal frame is smudged with fingerprints as if someone reaches for it often. The warmth caught inside all those photographs presses into Rudo with a strange, aching heaviness, reminding him just how different this place is from the life he came from.
When Enjin clears his throat, Rudo tears his gaze away from the photos and turns to find him watching him with quiet amusement. Heat rises at once to his face.
Enjin lifts the plate in one hand. “Eat.”
Rudo grimaces at the greenery stuffed into the sandwich, but Enjin only sighs, as though this is deeply predictable, and steers him toward the edge of the bed.
He flips one half of the sandwich open, plucks out the tomato and cucumber, and drops them into his own mouth without ceremony.
“Here. At least eat the lettuce. You need all the nutrients you can get.” His golden eyes narrow as they skim over Rudo’s thin frame.
With a put-upon huff, Rudo takes the sandwich and bites into it. It is not terrible. The meat and cheese do a decent job of disguising the lettuce, but the lingering trace of cucumber makes him gag, and when Enjin abruptly offers him a water bottle, he takes it with silent gratitude and washes the taste away.
Cross-legged in the dimness, Rudo stares down at his gloved hands as he finishes eating, his fingers still twitching faintly with the last remnants of the nightmare.
As though he can feel the shape of Rudo’s thoughts turning inward, Enjin leans back against the wall and speaks in a voice so quiet it barely seems like his. Whatever happened on the Sphere, they would face it a day at a time. Down here, with the Cleaners, Rudo does not have to carry everything by himself anymore. The certainty in those words is simple, almost gentle, and it slips through his exhaustion until at last his shoulders begin to loosen.
When he has finished the sandwich, Rudo makes to stand and return to his own room, ready to try for sleep again. Enjin catches his wrist gently in his hand before he can get far and murmurs, “Stay.”
He sets the plate aside on the desk, climbs onto the bed, and gently tugs Rudo down beside him, guiding him into place until he is tucked between Enjin’s solid warmth and the wall.
Enjin draws the covers over them both and shifts until he is comfortable on his side, close enough to nearly spoon him. Rudo goes still with surprise. Within minutes, Enjin’s breathing evens out, and Rudo realises with a strange mix of resignation and something softer that he is not going anywhere until Enjin wakes – or loosens that absurdly strong hold enough to let him slip free.
He can feel Enjin’s breath against his face and neck, warm and steady, but he does not mind it. It is only Enjin, solid, warm, simply there. Safe. Little by little, Rudo’s breathing falls into the same quiet rhythm, and a gentle warmth unfurls low in his chest. When he closes his eyes this time, the nightmares do not come. For the first time since his fall to the ground, sleep takes him whole and leaves him in peace.
The next morning, Rudo wakes alone beneath no fewer than three blankets. He has no memory of seeing them the night before, and he lingers beneath their warmth for a long moment.
He gets up, and life moves on as though nothing happened at all.
ii
Everything hurts.
Rudo’s head throbs, his body feels bruised all over, and his hands ache worst of all.
He feels like an exposed nerve, raw and tender, too easy to hurt. Fragile. A little broken.
The mission Team Akuta had completed earlier should have been an easy one. The low-level trash beasts had gone down quickly beneath the team’s new power and growing coordination. There had been a thrill in taking to the air and bringing them down, but even that easy victory had cost Rudo more than he wanted to admit.
They had not made it back to HQ before nightfall, and after an hour of relentless rain, the roads had become too dangerous to travel. So, they had taken shelter at a nearby inn, the girls in one room and Rudo with the boys in another. Everyone else had fallen asleep almost at once.
Rudo, however, lies awake. Too many nights of broken sleep – or no sleep at all – have finally begun to catch up with him, and now every part of him aches.
He pulls the pillow from beneath his head and wraps his arms around it, as though that might shut the world out for a while.
Someone in the bed to his left is snoring. Rudo has no idea who; he had not paid much attention to who took which bed before the lights went out. Right now, he only knows he wants to cry. The lump in his throat thickens, his eyes sting, and still he refuses. He hates crying. But everything hurts, it is all getting too much, and he does not know how much more he can bear.
Rudo can’t.
It is all just too much – he
“Rudo?” Enjin’s voice comes softly from the bed to his right.
“Hey, Rudo, are you awake?” Enjin whispers, barely louder than a breath, but even that small sound eases the wild pace of Rudo’s pulse. Rudo clears his throat and tries to make his answer sound normal, instead of like the unravelling he had been only moments away from.
“Uh, yeah. What’s up?”
“It’s freezing up in here, and I can’t sleep with all the shivering you’re doing. So, get your butt over here and share some heat with me. Or go huddle with Zanka or Follo.”
Rudo had not even realised he was shivering, too long in the spiral of his own thoughts. But the moment Enjin says it, he feels the tremors running through his thin body beneath the threadbare blanket. Oh. So that is why his hands hurt. The bitter cold of the northern ward had bitten into his forearms and pulled at the burned skin beneath his bandages, leaving them tight and sore.
“A-are you sure?” he asks, stuttering through another shiver.
Enjin only lifts his blanket in silent invitation.
For a moment, Rudo thinks about refusing. But it really is cold, and it is not as though they have never shared a bed before. So, he gathers his thin blanket and pillow and slips in beside Enjin. The bed gives a quiet squeak beneath their combined weight. He spreads his own blanket over Enjin’s and curls in on himself, hugging the pillow and trying not to take up too much space.
Enjin watches him for a moment, then takes the pillow away and replaces it with the hard, warm line of his own body, folding himself around Rudo and pressing his cold nose into the side of his neck.
Rudo squeaks in surprise and flails, but he cannot wriggle free. Enjin lets out a quiet huff that might almost be a laugh, and eventually Rudo gives up and goes still.
They settle beneath the heap of blankets, and though Rudo hates to admit it, Enjin is an excellent source of warmth. Solid and comfortable against him, he makes Rudo think, and not for the first time, of how safe he feels in his arms.
Somewhere between Enjin asking if he was awake and Rudo’s ice-cold toes finding Enjin’s warmer ones, everything stops hurting quite so much.
He lets his eyes drift shut and breathes in the scent around him – sweet and earthy, the cologne he has come to associate with Enjin. Beneath it lingers something warmer, fainter, and oddly calming.
Before he knows it, Rudo is blinking awake again to sunlight spilling through the windows. A groan draws his attention, and when he looks over, he finds Follo staring at him with a pout.
But it is Zanka, lacing his boots, who asks, “Why are you an’ Enjin sleepin’ in the same bed?”
Still half asleep, Rudo only blinks at them. It takes him a long second to register the strong, tattooed arm draped around his waist.
Trying not to make more of it than it is, he answers with the simple truth. “I was cold.”
Follo’s pout softens at once into sympathy. “Aww, Rudo. If I’d known you were cold, I would’ve kept you warm. Or at least loaned you my jacket.” He finishes with a blush dusting across his cheeks.
That only makes heat rise to Rudo’s face as well, and he stammers out a quiet, “It’s okay,” before adding, “I’ll keep that in mind next time.”
All three of them startle when Enjin suddenly sits up with a loud yawn. His arm is still around Rudo’s waist, and as he rises, he unconsciously pulls Rudo closer, nearly into his lap, until Rudo squirms free with a string of curses.
“Let go, scuzzball.”
Enjin sighs dramatically, shivers at the cold morning air, and finally lets him go.
“Gris and the girls are already downstairs. Hurry up and get dressed. I’m ready to ditch this freezing hellscape,” Zanka grumbles as he stomps out of the room.
It does not take them long to bundle up against the cold and head home.
iii
For all his fierce resolve to stand unaided and depend on no one, Rudo was defenceless against the deep, marrow-heavy weariness that claimed him whenever sleep brushed the edges of his mind.
It happened by accident, there in a warm disarray of the recreation room. Rudo had meant only to ease his aching body onto the couch beside Enjin for a moment’s rest, yet the slow, steady cadence of Enjin’s breathing drew him under with quiet inevitability.
In sleep, some unguarded part of him reached for the safety he had so long been denied. His gloved hand closed around a fold of Enjin’s shirt with quiet, stubborn force, as though the fabric itself were a tether keeping him from slipping away. For the first time since the mission to the northern ward, peace found him at last, borne on the silent, watchful presence at his side.
When Amo stepped into the recreation room an hour later, the sight of Rudo asleep against Enjin lit a bitter jealousy in her chest. She loathed Enjin – saw him as a brash, insufferable nuisance who had stolen her precious boots – and to find the boy she cared for seeking solace in him felt like a private affront.
A dark scowl sharpened her features as she stared at Rudo’s hand knotted in Enjin’s clothing, the small, unguarded gesture of trust and vulnerability she wished with sudden ferocity had been meant for her. Her fists clenched at her sides until her knuckles blanched, every part of her straining against the urge to cross the room and tear him away. That it was Enjin, of all people, who had become the shelter Rudo needed was almost more than she could bear.
Why him?
Enjin caught Amo’s furious stare the moment she entered, and rather than move away, he answered it with the faint curl of the dark, almost merciless smile. He was fiercely protective of Rudo, and he saw far too clearly through her. She did not understand Rudo – not truly. What possessed her was not understanding, but a selfish longing to cast him as her saviour and claim his devotion as something owned.
Leaning back into the couch, Enjin slipped a deliberate, possessive arm around Rudo’s shoulders and drew him closer, tucking the sleeping boy against his chest. Then, with measured slowness, he threaded his fingers through Rudo’s unruly hair and smoothed it into place with a tenderness so plain it could only be provocation.
His smile sharpened as he lowered his head to rest against Rudo’s, a silent declaration that this was where Rudo belonged – and a challenge for Amo to try and take him away.
iv
After another gruelling mission purging trash beasts on the dusty fringes of Canvas Town, Rudo’s energy completely bottomed out, his heavy eyelids finally winning the battle as he slumped sideways and knocked his forehead against Zanka’s shoulder.
Zanka let out a sharp, quiet huff, but before he could shove the boy off, Enjin reached over with a soft grunt, gently shifting Rudo’s limp head to rest on his own broad, coat-covered shoulder instead. Watching the boy settle deeply into his fourth impromptu nap in Enjin’s presence.
Zanka crossed his arms and muttered, “You know, the brat actually stays asleep when he’s glued to you; normally, he’s twitchin’ like a stepped-on bug or up all night clangin’ away at whatever the hell he’s tinkering with in his room.
Enjin offers a small, unusually quiet smile, his eyes tracing the boy’s face as he replies. “He’s safe here, Zanka. Look at him – those dark smudges under his eyes are finally getting lighter.”
Zanka shifted his weight, his eyes lingering on the boy’s peaceful face for a long moment before he looked away with a gruff, reluctant huff.
“Yeah, well, I guess he ain’t completely hollowed out anymore,” he mutters, kicking a stray pebble across the dirt floor. “Of course, he feels safe here with us, but he doesn’t fall asleep like this just because I’m here, or Riyo, or anyone else, for that matter. It’s only with you.”
Enjin went quiet, his usual boisterous grin softening as he seriously considered Zanka’s words. He looked down at Rudo’s peaceful face, realising that to a kid who had been betrayed and literally thrown away by the world above, safety wasn’t a geographical location – like HQ or Canvas Town – it was a personal anchor. Someone he unconsciously felt safe with.
Hooking one strong arm under the boy’s knees and supporting his back with the other, Enjin lifted Rudo effortlessly, adjusting him against his chest before trekking out with Zanka toward the parked Cleaner’s Jeep. As the boy’s head lolled against his chest, Enjin couldn’t help but remember the sharp, green-eyed, and flat-out jealous glare Amo had shot his way the last time Rudo had fallen asleep right by his side.
Amo completely adored Rudo, acting like a fiercely possessive shield, yet she absolutely detested Enjin, and he knew her envy over the boy’s exclusive affection was a ticking time bomb.
Settling Rudo gently into the Jeep’s back seat, Enjin started across the dusty horizon, quietly pondering what chaotic friction would unfold next once Amo realised her favourite person, her saviour, kept seeking comfort from the one man she couldn’t stand.
v
For the first time, Rudo had no excuse to hide behind – not the cold, nor the old terrors that haunted his sleep – as he stood outside Enjin’s door with his jaw set tight against pride. The truth was plain and simple, and no less humiliating for it: he could not sleep unless that steady, reassuring cadence of breath was there to anchor him.
Swallowing the last of his defences, he drew a measured breath, knocked softly, and stepped inside the moment Enjin’s voice bid him enter.
Without explanation, and stripped for once of his usual hostility, Rudo dripped face-first onto the bed and buried himself in sheets that carried Enjin’s scent. In that mute, stubborn surrender lay a truth he could no longer deny; this, somehow, had become his sanctuary.
No teasing smile touched Enjin’s mouth. He understood at once what it had cost Rudo to come here of his own accord. A weighty stillness settled over the room as he watched from his desk, taking in the rare and fragile sight of Rudo curled in his bed.
In that hush, Enjin’s feelings sharpened into sudden clarity. It was no longer mere duty, nor instinct alone. Watching Rudo seek refuge in his presence, he recognised at last that the fierce, possessive ache in his chest was love – deep-rooted, overwhelming, and impossible to deny.
Without a word, Enjin rose, crossed the room, and gently drew the comforter free beneath him, his touch lingering for the briefest instant – as though to honour the truth he had finally named within himself.
In the weeks that followed, Enjin’s protectiveness took on a quieter shape. What had once been territorial possessiveness softened into something steadier, more deliberate devotion rather than claim.
During training, he stopped hanging back and leaving the work to Zanka. Instead, he stepped forward, guiding both Rudo and Zanka through defensive drills with an unexpected patience, while his gaze lingered on Rudo with a quiet intensity that spoke of a care no longer easily concealed.
Rudo, ever alert to shifts in those around him, noticed the change at once. The heavy arm once thrown across his shoulders was gone, replaced by something gentler, a hand at the small of his back that felt less like possession and more like protection freely given.
The air between them grew dense with all that remained unspoken, and Rudo’s heart began to race – not with panic this time, but with a warmth he had no language for.
The strain between them finally gave way late one night in the oil-scented hush of the garage, as they finished mending the transport truck that had blown a tyre on the road home from a mission earlier that day.
Rudo stood frozen by the workbench, his gloved fingers trembling slightly as he clamped down on a wrench, acutely aware that Enjin had finished his work and stepped up directly behind him, closing the distance until the heat radiating from the older man’s chest brushed against his back.
Without a word, Enjin reached out, his large, calloused hand gently covering Rudo’s gloved knuckles to stop the trembling, his voice dropping to a low, raw whisper that shattered the silence of the room.
“I’ve spent these past few weeks making a fool of myself,” Enjin murmured, his breath warm against the nape of Rudo’s neck as he slowly turned him to face him. He rested his forehead against Rudo’s, steadying them both. “I told myself I was only trying to keep you safe, but it was never just that. The truth is, I love you – completely, selfishly, entirely. I don’t want you carrying your fears alone any longer. I want to be the one who helps you bear them, if you’ll let me.”
Rudo could only stare up at him, his breath caught fast in his throat as the honesty of the confession laid bare everything he had been trying, futilely, to outrun.
Neither of them noticed the slight creak of the garage door or the shadow frozen in the doorway. Amo stood paralysed in the dim hallway, her breath catching as the devastating words echoed through the cavernous room, shattering her romantic illusions and leaving her to swallow the bitter truth: Rudo’s heart would never belong to her.
And there, in the deepening quiet, Enjin kept his forehead pressed to Rudo’s and let the silence stretch as he waited for an answer, their future poised delicately between hope and fear while the night wore on.
In the days that followed, Amo began to scheme.
She would not let the confession in the garage defeat her. Instead, a desperate resolve took hold, and she set herself to winning Rudo’s heart, heedless of the harm her obsession might do to herself, to him, and to the fragile thread of friendship between them.
Her resolve soon curdled into a quiet campaign against the leader of Team Akuta. She laced every conversation with him with venom, taking sly aim at his age, his competence with his vital instrument, and his overbearing ways with his team members, while ‘accidentally’ mislaying his tools and meddling with his gear. Yet whenever Gris or any of the others challenged her hostility, Amo slipped at once into innocence, pleading clumsiness or misunderstanding and casting herself as someone who merely required patience.
Enjin spared her very little thought.
Later that week, his attention lay elsewhere, fixed on the quiet shift unfolding in the privacy of his room. In the soft pool of lamplight, Rudo sat cross-legged upon the bed and at last lifted his ruby eyes to Enjin, who rested against the headboard.
Ruby to gold.
The usual stammering defences fell away, replaced by a raw and unguarded honesty as he confessed that he, too, had been falling in love – slowly, helplessly – through the long weeks and months of peaceful, dreamless sleep that only Enjin’s presence had ever granted him. But he was quick to reassure that it wasn’t just because of that.
“I love you because you make me feel safe and understood in a way that I never did on the Sphere with Regto.” Rudo continued, breathing heavily, “I love you because you make me laugh and smile. I love your confidence, even if it makes you cocky. I love your big dumb hands when you hold me close at night, and I love your tattoos and your stupidly attractive smile. I love you because you're you.” He finishes quietly, bashfully.
Moved beyond restraint by the honesty in those words, Enjin finally yielded. He lifted a hand to cradle Rudo’s cheek and kissed him softly, tenderly on the lips, leaving Rudo still and blushing with shock while Enjin laughed under his breath with helpless affection.
He had no idea how he was meant to survive what came next if Rudo continued to undo him so completely.
“I love you, too, Rudo.”
The gravity of their mutual confession was almost absurdly undercut the following morning when they entered the dining room side by side. Riyo and the other Cleaners barely glanced up from breakfast as they passed thick wads of cash between them, settling a long-running betting pool.
Months ago, it seemed, they had all recognised that the two fools were falling in love long before either of them had dared name it.
Later, when Amo saw the rest of the Cleaners opening rejoicing in Rudo and Enjin’s new closeness, the careful façade she had built around herself cracked at last, and the brightness of the room only drove her obsession beyond its breaking point.
In the days that followed, her petty acts of sabotage hardened into something uglier and more deliberate. At last, Enjin drew her into a private meeting with Semiu and Arkha Corvus, the formidable leader of the Cleaners, in a dimly lit office where Corvus watched with a silence as heavy as judgment.
There, Amo came apart completely. Her amber eyes burned with a wild, brittle intensity as she thrust a trembling finger at Enjin. “He doesn’t belong to you. He belongs to Amoe. He saved Amo. He gave Amo flowers and promised to stay with her.” Her voice frayed under the weight of old trauma as she fought against the collapse of the fantasy she had built to survive.
Enjin neither recoiled nor answered in anger. Instead, his golden eyes gentled with quiet compassion as he stepped forward and bent to meet her gaze. “Amo, love isn’t about owning someone. It’s about becoming their safe harbour when their heart and mind are caught in a storm,” he said, his gravel-rough voice cutting cleanly through her hysteria with the simple truth of what Rudo needed.
“I love him, and he loves me.”
He spoke with such unadorned certainty that it seemed less like a declaration than a truth he had always carried – that meeting Rudo had been inevitable and loving him no less so.
Amo choked on her rage, tearful and bitter, as his words forced her at last to confront what she had long refused to see: Rudo had chosen Enjin freely, and no amount of longing could undo it.
Afterwards, Corvus intervened with firm compassion and placed Amo into another intensive therapy to address the trauma at the root of her obsession. Under his guidance, she began the slow, painful work of unravelling her hunger for affection from her need to possess what she feared to lose.
Meanwhile, in the quiet refuge of Enjin’s room, the noise of the world seemed to fall away. After a gruelling day, Rudo slipped inside in his pyjamas and climbed into bed beside him, shedding his usual defences as he sought the one place where he felt wholly safe.
Enjin shifted at once to receive him, drawing him close within the strong circle of his tattooed arms.
A soft kiss brushed his temple as he settled there.
Curled against the steady rise and fall of Enjin’s chest, Rudo let his eyes drift shut and surrendered to a deep, untroubled sleep, cradled by the love that had finally become his safe harbour.
As Rudo’s breathing deepened into an easy rhythm, Enjin looked down at him with a tenderness that felt almost reverent, brushing a stray lock of hair from his forehead with the lightest touch.
With a quiet sigh, he drew the blanket higher over Rudo’s shoulders and gathered him a little closer, as though even in sleep he could not bear to leave him without comfort.
Feeling the full, fragile trust in the way Rudo yielded to him, Enjin rested his chin gently atop his head and gave himself over to the quiet, aching sweetness of keeping him safe. Certain that his warmth, his arms, and his love would hold the darkness at bay, he closed his eyes at last and followed Rudo into sleep.
-fin-