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Alessio felt Nithel nod, and he was trying to pay attention everything was turning numb. He didn’t want to feel anything anymore, he didn’t want to have to think.

Fear not…for I have created…

He couldn’t remember the words, not in order at least. Just in fragments, like broken thoughts or phrases. It was a stupid thing to fixate on, but it was one thing he could almost handle. It was routine, and the closest thing to safe he could remember.

After a second, Alessio felt himself squeezed gently. He let himself sink into that warmth, he just wanted to comply. It was stupid, he was sure it was stupid to expect anyone to save him, to just somehow take care of everything. He couldn’t afford to be useless and leave things to someone else..?

He was just working up the willpower to just attempt to function again when Nithel spoke.

“I have a son, Alessio.” It came softly, almost imperceptibly through the numb wall of his brain shutting off any sensation that could touch his emotions. But he heard. Vaguely, he gave up his pathetic struggling for a fix to listen

“His name is Domnik.” Nithel said, his voice an edge away from breaking. “He is thirteen, now.

“I lost him.”

The words fell into the silence like a void.

Alessio had felt helpless in a lot of different ways, but never quite like this. He’s never known someone well enough to feel this way for them. Or…loved someone like this. All the twisted, sick mistakes he experienced in the plastered label of love came swirling back but he just listened.

“I always told him to stay close, in battle. In camp.” No one can ever protect you even if they try. No one ever saves you…

What was it like for someone to actually try to protect you? Did it make you feel better, or worse, when it inevitably happens?

Trying to believe he actually meant to keep Alessio safe in some distorted logic, somewhere under it all. He’d never forget the first year of being kidnapped, trying so hard to convince himself that this was something misguided, not truly evil. It wasn’t hard, just agonizingly painful, trying to pretend a lie in the face of reality.

Everything was sick and hazy, then Alessio realized Nithel was still speaking. For a couple seconds he couldn’t make out the words, he just listened because the sound of his voice made Alessio feel safer.

“When I turned, Dom was gone. I searched for days, after the battle.” It was registering. It just wasn’t sinking in. Alessio wasn’t sure anymore whether this was real or just a crazy fever dream. Normally, he wouldn’t have been able to imagine Nithel in battle, but everything was so wrong he could see almost anything.

“I wanted to find him…but I didn’t.” The words came slowly, softly. “We didn’t find him.”

Pause. Nithel must’ve searched forever.

“The Adenites took prisoners.”

Alessio swallowed hard. He was intimately acquainted with what happens to prisoners. Thirteen. No one deserved to live through that. No one deserved to wonder if someone they loved was going through that at this very moment. Wondering if you weren’t just failing them then but every moment you couldn’t come to their rescue…

“They took him. Or Dom’s dead. From people I’ve seen-“ His voice barely came through, then. “I almost hope he’s dead.”

‘But you believe he’s still alive.’ Nithel used the present tense describing his son. Without that, Alessio knew how hard it was to give up on even the most remote, intangible hope.

All his emotions seemed stunned into the familiar dim sensation that could only process the logical side. He was trying to force his mind to feel, to come up with something consoling, to have something to say. His friend always knew how to make Alessio feel safer…

“Alessio.” Nithel said gently, bring him back to awareness. He touched the top of Alessio’s head or…Alessio’s eyes widened slightly, realizing he couldn’t be shook and pet on the head at the same time. So he concluded he had just hallucinated the warm sensation because no one would ever kiss him paternally. He felt chagrinned to have even imagined that, but still looked up at his friend, trying very hard to focus all his attention away from the dark, enclosed room.

“Alessio.” Nithel said again, motioning with his head to something ahead. Alessio really didn’t want to glance around but he made an attempt to comply. “Will you do it?”

It took Alessio a second to notice the crevice in the wall but anything Nithel said after that blanked out. Just a simple, small black box opening into the dark almost like some child’s hiding cubby. A near hysteric laugh escaped Alessio.

“That’s a joke, right?” He said before he could take it back, not directing it so much at Nithel as at what seemed like the most sick, sadistic phenomenon called life. Everything was always conspiring against him, it was just laughable.

But the next instant it was just hateful, nothing else.

“Fine.” He spat under his breath at the Castle. He closed his eyes, sucking in a calming breath.

They had to live.

Nithel had to live.

Hot sparks flutter through his fingers. Before he could talk himself out of it, Alessio vaulted the crevice, squeezing his eyes shut the whole time and climbing by touch. He could break in the middle of it easy and he knew it, so he scrambled up at a dangerously breakneck speed, cursing loudly every time he nearly slipped, which was quite frequently.

‘FearnotforIhavecreatedyou,fearnotforIhavecreatedyou…’ The moment his burst of furious determination flickers out he’s going to panic, but if he just fixates on…

It’s dark and it’s literally spiraling in circles as he crawls forward. He made the mistake of opening his eyes and even though he knows he’s hallucinating he flinches with another involuntary oath. Frantically, Alessio tried to remember the tune of the song Mayra had sung, he didn’t know why that came to mind he just needed something right now to push him forward. It just wasn’t coming back, he couldn’t remember any of it.

“N-nithel?!” If he heard his friend’s voice behind him maybe he could make it, the farthest he’d thought this through was he’d be forced to keep going once he got in. It had occurred to him that might not be physically possible for him but he’d intentionally drowned the thought out because he *needed* to do this to survive…

 

@kimlikesart (sry I’m late again…😕❤️)