Fear

Okay! Took a while to remodel this...and I'm still not happy with it. Maybe I'll redo it again later, but I really want to get it up now while it's got the 'feel' I want to it.

You know the rules; Don't like? Don't read. Do like? Please review ^_^.

A/N: After the first paragraph, I randomly imagined Seiya in a monkey costume. o_o; It's a rather interesting image.

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~*Fear*~

~Chapter Five~

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Seiya sat at the dinner table, glumly poking at the food from the kitchens with a rather indifferent fork. His spirits were so low...he wasn't used to being the monkey in the middle.

He'd been trying to get Taiki and Yaten to talk...just talk for nearly two weeks. Neither had even tried to help him. Noooo...they had to stay as far away from each other as possible. Of course.

He knew he wasn't being fair, especially to Yaten, but he honestly didn't care. If she couldn't trust them, who could she trust?

Both of them were out, right now. Taiki was probably off brooding somewhere...maybe the gardens. And Yaten was somewhere...he wasn't sure where, but he'd know if something was wrong. Seiya couldn't hold a candle to Yaten in sensing things, but he could certainly tell if she were in trouble...mostly because she'd be yelling at him.

He'd tried to get Yaten to stay in the room the other day and had actually gotten a smack from her. She'd been in a pissy mood ever since the Incident. Granted, she had a good reason, but did she have to take it out on him?

He just wished he could throw them into a room together for a few hours...of course, then he'd be in serious shit. They'd BOTH be mad at him after they got out. But hey, at least they would have been together. It'd be better than all of this damned separation.

Stirring the food on his plate absently with his fork, he tried to think of ways to get Taiki and Yaten to make up. He willed any idea, no matter how crazy, to come to him. He'd figure out a way to make it work.

Somehow.

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"But-"

"No, Yaten. If you really want to find out, there's only one way to do it."

"Princess...I can't." Yaten hunched herself over, drawing her knees up to her chest and slipping her arms around them. "I can't go anywhere near him now without remembering what he did to me." A tear slid down her cheek when she squeezed her eyes shut. "I can't push that away...I've tried."

"Well, unfortunately, you'll never find out who's telling the truth unless you try." Kakyuu placed a hand on the silver-haired teen's shoulder. Yaten winced, but nodded. She knew that...she just didn't want to do it.

"I'll try, Princess." She murmured. Kakyuu's scarlet eyes held deep sympathy for the silver-haired teen. "Here. How about I go look for him...see if I can hear his side of the story. If I think he's telling the truth, I'll discreetly send him to you, okay?"

Yaten's face slipped into a watery smile. "Thank you, Princess." She replied, unfolding herself and standing. Kakyuu smiled widely, standing as well. "You go back to the apartment you three share...I'll go look for him."

The silver-haired teen nodded, turning to leave. Before Kakyuu left as well, she gazed out her window for a moment at the lonely figure in the gardens, a tall shadow in the sunset light. At least she could find her third guardian easily.

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Taiki walked over to a large tree, sitting down against it and imagining the pulse of life in the wood behind him. Unfortunately, the rhythm reminded him of what had happened the night of the Incident and he shook his head to chase away the imagined pulse.

Slipping off the short, silky gloves he wore, he stroked his fingers up and down the red scars on his right hand. His hand slowly but surely contracted into a fist and squeezed, exercising the newly-healed tendons there. He repeated the gesture twice or three times more, making sure the wounded areas didn't get stiff.

"Taiki?"

The mahogany-haired teen's head snapped up to look at the one who'd interrupted his exercises. He hurriedly slipped on his gloves so that Kakyuu wouldn't notice the marks from his self-punishment and looked up at her. "Yes, Princess?" He asked, voice level.

"I wanted to talk to you." She replied, sitting down near him. Something in her tone made him sense that she knew about what had happened. "Whose side of the story do you know, Princess? Yaten's, or mine?" He inquired, a touch of bitterness creeping into his tone.

She surprised him with her answer. "Both." Her smile was wry. "But I wanted to hear it from you."

Taiki glanced at her. A soft breath with the hint of a sarcastic chuckle on it came from him before he looked back down at his hands. He absently stroked his gloved right hand for a few moments before obliging her, telling his side of the story again.

Truth radiated from him as he spoke. He held back quite a bit, not wanting to really get into the details and in the process making sure he wouldn't start crying again, but everything he said was the absolute truth, so far as she could tell. Time to send him back to the apartment.

The evening had grown cool. Kakyuu shivered, the thin sleeves of her gown offering little protection against the drop in temperature. Taiki, noticing this, stood and offered her a hand. "Come on, Princess. Let's get you inside." He smiled, though the expression had a touch of sadness to it. "I don't want you catching a cold out here."

"Thank you, Taiki. It is chilly out here, isn't it?" She stood with his help and they both headed inside.

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A soft creak signalled Taiki's arrival back home. Yaten stood up, every muscle tense. When he saw her, he tensed up as well. "Hello, Yaten."

"C..." She swallowed, her mouth suddenly paper-dry. "Can I talk to you?"

He blinked at her, surprised. "I...Okay." He walked towards the living room, swerving around her so there wouldn't be any mistaken contact. "What d'you want to talk to me about?"

"A...about...well...about that night..." Why was this suddenly so hard? She'd been rehearsing what she wanted to say for the past hour or so...why was it so hard for the words to come out? Unbidden, a memory surfaced; the gleeful look on his face when he'd sunk his fingers into her that night. She shut her eyes and shook her head, banning that image from her head.

"What about that night?" He asked, voice wary.

Yaten finally began to shake so much that she lost her nerve. Turning, she stalked away from him, trying to push away her pain with anger.

"Yaten, wait, please!" He lurched forward and took ahold of her arm. In his haste, he grabbed her more tightly than he really meant to, and she recoiled in turn. He lost his hold on her arm for a moment when her right hand, nails bared, slammed into the side of his face. The moment was all she needed to yank herself away and hurry up the stairs. Taiki found himself standing in the living room alone, slightly dazed, one arm outstretched and a bright red hand mark on his left cheek.

Her violent reaction didn't stop him completely, though. He went up the stairs after her and found her door closed and locked. Resting his forehead on the warm wood of the door, he called out to her. "Yaten?"

"Leave me alone!" Her voice was choked up, like she was crying. A sharp, swift pain flew through the auburn-haired teen's chest, like someone had taken his heart and wrung it cruelly. "Yaten...I...I'm sorry." He called through the wood. "I should have done more to stop what happened...please...let me in." His hands were shaking. Well, actually, his left hand was shaking. His right hand was doing this funky twitching thing that was probably the result of the damaged nerves and tendons under his healing skin. "Let me explain it to you."

There was silence for a moment as she pondered his request. "All right." She replied, somewhat warily. "But I'm leaving the door open while you do."

"Agreed." Taiki nodded, hearing the click of the tumblers as she unlocked the door. Opening it, he found her sitting on her bed, huddled up with a pillow tucked under her chin. Her eyes were red and teary, her long white legs drawn up as if to protect herself from him. Whatever being that was wrenching at his heart gave it another brutal twist. He hated to see her so afraid of him.

He took up a position at the end of the bed - not too close, but close enough that he could tell whether or not she believed him. Her sparkling green eyes watched him closely as he settled himself across the bed from her. Finally he looked up and met her gaze with his. "Are you ready to listen to me?"

"I think so." She responded, still a little nervous. With that, he began to relate the story to her. His first encounter with the voice in his head. His blackouts. That final, horrific night when he lost the battle for control with this alter ego of his.

"I know you were hurt terribly. It must have been devastating. It was horrible for me to watch you being raped...and I couldn't do anything. I tried...maybe I should have tried harder. But..." Here he paused and ran a hand through his unkempt hair, then met her eyes and held them. "I want you to know that...that yes, I do love you. Maybe more than I really understand. It was never my intention to come in this room that night and do what he made my body do to you." He hunched over, trying to blink back tears. He knew that she wouldn't thank him later if he broke down now.

She'd unfolded herself during the course of his story, constantly monitoring him. He was open; he knew she couldn't be assured of his honesty unless she felt it herself. Now she hesitantly put her hand on his shoulder, making him look back at her. "You really do love me? That wasn't something he made up?"

Taiki shook his head, looking almost defeated. "No. He didn't make it up. I don't know when it happened, or why, but I...I..." He bit his lip. "I've fallen in love with you."

Silence reigned for a few minutes as Yaten tried to digest that information. Well. Okay. He'd just proclaimed his love for her. "Wow. Okay." She scratched the back of her head a little, slightly overwhelmed. She hated to say it, but she owed him the truth. "I...I can't reciprocate those feelings, Taiki. I'm sorry. What with everything that's gone on, and..." She sighed. "I...maybe some day I could feel the same way about you. But not right now. Not after what's happened."

She looked up into his eyes, dreading to find pain, but was relieved to see that he didn't look too upset. In fact, he almost looked more relieved than she was. "I didn't expect you to." He replied, a wry smile gracing his lips. "I guess I just wanted you to know."

Taiki let the silence wear on as he squeezed his hand shut again, working the muscles there. The silky fabric stretched over his scars, making them visible for a moment. Yaten's sharp eyes caught the imperfections in the cloth and looked over at his hands, a little confused. "What was that?" She asked curiously.

The auburn-haired teen looked back at her face. When he followed her gaze to his hands, he took his right hand in his left and began to rub at it gently. "It's nothing." She caught his eye and glared at him.

"You can't lie to me, Taiki. Not while you've still got yourself wide open." Her silver eyebrows arched in annoyance. "Just tell me."

Sighing, he let her take ahold of his hand. She pulled away the cloth glove and was astonished to see the latticework scars running down his hand. Turning it over, she found even more damage running down his palm. "What happened here?"

"After I left you, I went into the bathroom to try to...well...wash away what I had done. I barely remember doing that, but Seiya says that I went a little overboard while trying to 'cleanse myself.'" It was the best set of words he could think of to use. "He cleaned me up."

"Holy..." She quickly bit back the word she was going to use and looked up at him, shock in her eyes. "Taiki, I'm sorry. I..."

Taiki turned back around and took ahold of her wrist, cutting her off. "Listen to me." He requested. When she met his eyes, he continued. "This," He gestured at his hand. "This was not your fault, okay? I know it must feel like it, but the truth is, it's not. The only reason I did this was because I was upset. I thought that maybe if I cleaned myself up properly, you'd forgive me. I was irrational. I..." He stopped himself before he completely lost it. Once he was fairly calm again, he continued. "You had every reason to be upset. So don't blame yourself for this, okay?"

"I...I guess." She still felt incredibly guilty. Taiki noticed this and knew that he couldn't say much to change how she felt. Slipping his glove out of her grasp, he slid it back on. "Listen, I'm going to let you get some rest..." He stood and headed for the door, not meeting her eyes. "Good night."

"Wait!"

He stopped in the doorway and turned back around. "Yes?"

Yaten smiled, the first real smile he'd seen on her for two weeks. "Thanks for telling me."

"At least I could finally get you to listen." Taiki grinned softly, walking out with a final wave. Suprisingly enough, he didn't hear any violent outbursts as he left. Feeling heartened, he walked into his room and shut the door behind him. He slipped off his gloves and his glasses, folding them up and placing them on his bedside table.

Tomorrow, he would start again fresh.

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Yay! So happy! ^_^ But whenever something good happens to these two, it never lasts, right? Of course not, then there wouldn't be a story! ^_^ Let's just hope I can keep it up.