Andraeon collapsed into the armchair, his ears ringing, and put his head in his arms. Thick hair fell forward around his face like a curtain, hiding his features from view. For a long moment he just sat there, taking deep breaths and letting them out slowly until his headache started to fade a little. Emily had taken news of her father’s unconscious state about as well as he had expected, and he could still hear her screaming faintly inside his head. Kaede had been forced to sedate her again before she hurt them or damaged the house; and Andy had been too dazed by the loss of his mother to calm her as he usually did. Now they slept cuddled up in their shared bedroom, both of them pale and exhausted.
“Hey Drae.” Shiki touched his shoulder, making him jump. “You okay?”
“Yeah.” He sat up and tucked his hair behind both ears. “Just a bit of a headache.”
“She’s got a powerful set of lungs.” Shiki squeezed his shoulder and went to check on Jones, laying a hand on his cheek and closing his eyes for a moment. Andraeon watched him, hoping he’d see some sort of change, but Jones didn’t stir.
“Think he’ll wake up soon?” Andraeon asked, trying to keep his voice natural and not overly hopeful.
“I don’t know. Hopefully.” Shiki straightened up and sat on the edge of the bed. “It’s hard to tell with this kind of thing. There’s not a lot of... physical damage now but he’s taken a lot of beatings recently. This may just be his body’s way of saying enough.”
Andraeon sighed. “I just wish I’d thought before I went storming in there.”
“Welcome to the real world. Shas said he wanted to talk to us, by the way. You feel up to it?”
“Not really. I guess I’m hoping if I sit here long enough he’ll come back.” Andraeon offered half a smile. “Probably stupid, right?”
“If you think it’ll help, maybe it will. Just take care of yourself as well.” Shiki got up and headed out, ruffling Andraeon’s hair on the way by. He paused at the door and glanced back. “Don’t beat yourself up over it either. You didn’t mean to hurt him.”
Remembering the joy he’d felt, and the way it erased all concern he had for anyone else, Andraeon said nothing. Shiki studied him for a minute, then lifted a hand in a small wave and left the room. Andraeon listened to his footsteps go down the hall and then down the stairs, then turned back to Jones and took his limp hand. He traced the scars encircling Jones’s forearm, feeling the warmth of his skin, and studied his profile, willing him to open his eyes.
“Are you dreaming, Jones?” he asked softly. “I wonder if I can find you if you are.” He hesitated, thinking about trying it, but before he could, Shasta poked his head into the room and said his name. “What?”
“I do really need to talk to you. If you won’t come to me, I guess I’ll just do it here.” He came into the room and sat in the same spot Shiki had sat in earlier, absently brushing the back of his hand against Jones’s sheet-covered hip. Catching Andraeon’s glare, he dropped both hands in his lap. “Elle was here earlier.”
“Great,” Andraeon said noncommittally.
“She said we had to go after Aloria, before Aloria comes for us.”
“I can’t leave Jones.”
“Actually, this is sort of the perfect opportunity. Jones stays safe here and you can really unleash on her.”
Andraeon opened his mouth to snap at him, then stopped and really thought about it. It made a lot of sense, even if he rebelled at the thought of leaving with Jones still unconscious. Without Jones to protect, he wouldn’t have to hold back when they found Aloria, and he knew now that despite what she’d said, he was more than ready for her.
“Okay,” he said finally. “Just give me today. If Jones wakes up...”
“If he does, we can chat again. Or we can tell him to sit his skinny ass down and let us handle things.”
Andraeon smiled a bit. “Like he’d ever allow that.”
“Tie him to the bed.” Shasta pushed himself to his feet, wincing a bit and rubbing lightly at his shoulder. “I’m going to go lie down for a bit. Yell if you need anything.”
Andraeon lifted a hand as he left the room, then got up to shut the door. He stripped down to his shorts and crawled under the sheet with Jones, curling up against in his usual spot against his side and draping an arm over Jones’s stomach. He could feel the gentle rise and fall of Jones’s breathing, comfortingly steady. Closing his eyes, Andraeon hid his face against the curve of Jones’s neck and willed himself to go to sleep.
As he drifted off, he pictured the room they were lying in, hoping that it would somehow lead him to wherever Jones was. In the darkness behind his eyes the bedroom began to take shape as he saw it at night, when most of it was shadowed and blue in the moonlight. He didn’t feel himself fall asleep, but he suddenly realized that the warmth was gone from under his arm and he could no longer hear Jones’s breathing. A jolt of fear went through him and he sat up, the dark bedroom greeting him as he opened his eyes; but the room was completely empty.
“Jones?” He unconsciously kept his voice soft, afraid of drawing the wrong sort of attention. When no one answered, he got carefully out of bed and padded across to the half-open door, listening for any sound out in the hallway. The house remained unnaturally silent and he reminded himself that this was nothing but a dream, no matter how strange, as he pushed open the door and stepped out.
There was a light on downstairs, its faint glow just reaching the first few steps on the stairs. He went down towards it on light feet, wincing a little when one of the steps creaked with a sound so loud it seemed to echo through the house. Taking a deep breath he continued on, moving down the hallway and into the kitchen.
Jones sat at the kitchen table with his back towards the doorway where Andraeon stood watching him, resisting the urge to go right to him. Something was making him wary and he stayed where he was, trying to figure out what. Eventually he tentatively decided it was the way Jones was sitting, his shoulders hunched forward and his head down. Even from the doorway Andraeon could see the muscles tensed across his back under his shirt.
“Jones?” Andraeon asked, still softly. “Can you hear me?”
“I hear you.” Even his voice sounded odd, though Andraeon couldn’t pinpoint exactly why. “What do you want?”
“I want you to come home. I miss you.”
“I’m not ready to come home yet.”
“Why not?” Andraeon made his way around the table and started to take a seat, but froze when Jones finally lifted his head and looked at him. Jones’s eyes were black from lid to lid, their familiar blue-grey completely erased. “Jones?”
“Go away, Drae.” Jones looked down again and Andraeon saw he had a full glass of whiskey in front of him. Before Andraeon could stop him, he picked it up and downed most of it in one long swallow.
“Jones, this isn’t real.” Andraeon sat carefully on the edge of the seat. “You need to come back home now.”
Jones just shook his head, tracing a finger through the condensation on the glass. Between one blink and the next it refilled with golden whiskey. As he started to pick it up again, Andraeon shoved himself up from his chair and smacked it out of his hand, sending it spinning off the table to shatter on the tile floor. For the first time Jones actually showed an emotion: shock. Before Jones could move, Andraeon took his face in both hands and kissed him, tasting the whiskey on his lips and tongue. He felt Jones start in surprise, then Jones caught hold of his hips and pulled him in closer, onto his lap.
Andraeon forced himself to pull back after only a few moments, studying Jones’s face for any change. He thought he could see a hint of blue-grey in the blackness of Jones’s eyes and for the first time Jones actually seemed to be focused on him. Getting up, Andraeon coaxed him to his feet and led the way to the stairs, keeping a tight hold of Jones’s hand. He saw Jones look back once, at the glass which had reappeared whole and full on the kitchen table, but he didn’t resist when Andraeon gently caught his jaw and turned his face away.
They made their way up the stairs and Andraeon tugged Jones down the hall towards the bedroom, convinced now that it was the only way to bring Jones back. If he could just get Jones into bed here, he could bring them both back to the waking world.
They were just outside the door when Jones caught him around the waist and pinned him up against the wall, trapping his hands up over his head. He leaned in until their mouths were only inches apart but didn’t kiss Andraeon, hesitating instead and sliding his hands down to Andraeon’s shoulders. “I have to go,” he murmured, and before Andraeon could stop him, he had turned and walked away, vanishing after only a few steps.
Andraeon stared at the empty hallway for a long, numb moment, then a surge of anger went through him. He went after Jones as hard as he could, relying on instinct to tell him what to do and where to go. Jones appeared before him, walking through the fog of the between places with his head down. Picking up speed, Andraeon tackled him, knocking him flat and shoving him over before he could gather his wits. He sat his weight hard on Jones’s hips and grabbed his wrists, pinning them against the ground much as Jones had pinned him against the wall only minutes earlier.
“We are going home,” Andraeon growled. “I am not putting up with this anymore. Stop fighting me.”
Jones only looked at him, his face expressionless. He didn’t try to escape, though he had curled his fingers in against his palms and Andraeon could feel how tense his muscles were.
“You’re not even going to answer me?” Andraeon asked after a moment of silence, trying to catch and hold Jones’s gaze. “Then you can listen. This is ridiculous, Jones. You’ve spent years running away and now you’re just trying to do it again. It stops here and now. Whatever triggered this—”
“You,” Jones said quietly.
Andraeon closed his mouth with a snap and looked away. “I know,” he said after a minute ticked by in silence. “And I’m sorry.”
“You scare me.”
“I know.”
“Drae, look at me.” Reluctantly Andraeon did as he was told, startled when he saw that the blackness was almost completely gone from Jones’s eyes. “Drae, you scare the shit out of me and it makes me not want to be around you.” He offered half a smile. “Though I guess this is taking it to extremes.”
Andraeon laughed despite himself, though it was weak. “I don’t know what to do. I never want to hurt you. I just always do.”
“I know.” Jones freed a hand and reached up to cup his cheek. “I love you but I don’t know how much more of this I can take.”
“You don’t... we don’t have to decide now. Come home with me, Jones. Rest there and make sure Emily’s okay if nothing else. Okay?”
Jones pulled him down and kissed him lightly and briefly, a kiss Andraeon struggled not to think of as a goodbye. With the taste of whiskey still faint in his mouth, Andraeon pulled them back to the bedroom.
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