[ Resentment, acrid and poisonous, rises like his gorge – threatening to spill out from his mouth in a deluge of old hurts. But there’s a hand tethering him to the current moment, lifelines gently kissing his. This is not someone with whom he wants to fight. And so, exhaling heavily through the nose, Stiles relents. The hot surge of emotions boiling in his gut begins to simmer. He doesn’t acknowledge the point Itachi makes, nor the compliment to his intelligence. Instead, the teenager stares moodily ahead, set in opinion and unwilling to entertain counterarguments.
They remerge in the harsh sunlight, beyond the considerate coverage of leafy tree canopies. Late summer heat beats down on his body, ruthless. Stiles doesn’t spare a thought for the elements, however; he’s mulling over how to provide all the limited information he has on the Ghost Riders. ]
I’ll start from the beginning. [ Still tense, but lacking the dangerous edge from before. ] We were investigating a weird case. A car rolling down the road without anyone driving it, some kid named Alex in the backseat begging not to let “them” take him. He can’t remember anything and his parents are nowhere to be found. Scott, the werewolf alpha of my pack, uses his powers to watch the kid’s memories. Scott says he sees a guy on a horse with a gun. Sounds like more of my dad’s wheelhouse – y’know, a regular, non-supernatural crime that the police should handle. But I had a feeling. See, I timed Scott while he was in Alex’s head. Four minutes passed. Four minutes, and all he sees is a guy on a horse? No way. Something doesn’t add up.
We check out the car. Lydia – she’s a banshee, so she can sense the dead – says the parents didn’t die. She would know. Our resident werecoyote, Malia, can’t scent the parents at all. They chalk it up to a coincidence, claim I’m just looking to make a normal case supernatural when it’s not. [ There’s frustration evident in his body language even now; Stiles has had a lifetime of not being believed. ] Well, I notice something. The windshield. Other car windshields that’ve been shot at…the impact is like a ripple, right? The bullet hits, then creates spiderweb cracks through the glass. Not this car. The windshield is totally blown out. I start thinking that the suspect used a kind of magic bullet and grab a shard of the windshield. It’s coated in a blue powder.
Next day. My dad’s people searched the car; didn’t find any slugs from the bullet, or an exit hole in the windshield. And the home address that Alex, that kid, gave them? Leads to an abandoned house. Nothing makes sense. But no one’s taking me or the case seriously.
[He doesn't protect himself, or prepare, against the rising collision of those emotions—he is confident he can absorb every dark, spitting thought and feeling that might come out of Stiles with deliberate and understanding tenderness. There's no need for defensiveness. If it comes, he will be wide open to accept it. He has already decided to take everything the boy can possibly give him, the good and the bad, all that is in-between; he doesn't fear an argument. His hand stays soft in their grip, guiding them along the path, patient.
Stiles manages to rein himself back in, however, and the story starts.
The names are familiar. He knows Scott by now as someone that allowed Stiles to be beaten black and blue in a basement unrescued; he knows Lydia as the one Stiles has confessed to being in love with, back home. The flicker over Synchrony is subtle, subdued by his own quiet and resilient self-control in the moment, but still there—a burn of dislike that resembles annoyance. Gone in a blink, like the hot blue center of a flame. Itachi adjusts their hands, threading fingers where they were only cupping before, knuckle over knuckle, palms now in fuller contact.
And again, Stiles' stubborn pursuit of the truth, his cleverness in puzzling out a problem unparalleled to so many. His friends not believing him. This, Itachi has witnessed firsthand, in the memory of Stiles at the library. Stiles and Scott, by the vehicle in the woods. His mouth forms a grim line.]
I'm surprised, that after so long, they still don't trust your instinct. [A mild comment as dark eyes follow their path ahead. The shade returns, trees concealing them overhead.] ... Yes, I'm following.
[ Even distracted as he my be, Stiles notices the nearly imperceptible blip across Synchrony at the mention of his friends. Pinpointing small details like that has always been his specialty, after all. He doesn’t comment on it, but – once their fingers are intertwined – squeezes Itachi’s hand in acknowledgement. His feelings on the subject are complicated and confused. Originally, he had started to question his friendship with Scott back in Aefenglom, when his time point from home was directly after the supermoon. They were already on the rocks then, Stiles furious with the supposed alpha over the betrayal that nearly cost the Sheriff his life. But it didn’t help that, when compared against Aefenglom friends like Jonas and Sasuke, Scott just didn’t pass muster; he was too self-centered, too self-involved. The bitter truth? Scott McCall is a terrible best friend. Unfortunately, Stiles forgot this epiphany like everything else upon returning home to Beacon Hills. And so, he made up with Scott. Now that he’s in these dimensions again, his memories and personal growth restored, Stiles can only look back with regret.
Scott never even apologized to him.
Bastard. ]
They think of me like a broken clock, [ he remarks grimly, jerking one shoulder in the approximation of a dismissive shrug. Synchrony betrays the gesture; Stiles cares about the opinions of the pack more than he cares to admit. ] “He’s right at least twice a day.” Any other time? I’m just an unreliable spaz to them.
[ The self-depreciating line of thinking doesn’t help him. Forcing himself to move beyond the tangent, he continues with the story. ]
I guess…it’s important for me to mention that weird stuff started happening to me around that time. Like, a form that I distinctly remember filling out to have my yearbook photo taken was suddenly blank. Later, no one told me we had lacrosse practice and some other guy was wearing my jersey. The same jersey that I’ve worn every year since starting school. It was already happening, and we had no idea. [ He swallows, throat clicking audibly. ] I was being erased from existence.
I convinced Scott to come with me and check out the house. Just like the police said, the place was totally abandoned. It seemed like no one had lived there for years. Dust everywhere. But I found one room that wasn’t like the rest. Alex’s bedroom. It looked totally normal, as if the kid really did live there. Then I saw the photos. He was the only one in them, even when it didn’t make sense for him to be. Just for example, Alex had his arm up in the middle of the air, hanging onto nothing. People were missing from the photos.
I checked under the bed. When I did, I saw hooves across the room on the other side. But when I stood up, nothing was there. I got a nasty feeling. Ran out of the room and shut the door behind me. And wouldn’t you know, there’s a guy who fits Scott’s description at the other end of the hall. One of the Ghost Riders.
[ A clammy sweat breaks out along his skin. Stiles weathers a shudder. ]
The thing shot at me a few times, but missed. Scott hears the commotion and comes running upstairs. The Ghost Rider is gone. I tell Scott that I was attacked, that I think the guy from Alex’s memory made the kid’s parents disappear. We open the bedroom to Alex’s bedroom – and all his stuff is gone. The room is as empty and abandoned as the rest of the house now.
Finally everyone’s taking it seriously. We start researching mass disappearances. Eventually, Lydia realizes what the Ghost Riders are – they’re part of the Wild Hunt, a popular myth. In the myth, the souls of the dead hunt the living. It was said that seeing the Wild Hunt was a bad omen, usually leading to some catastrophe or death. As for the Wild Hunt itself, they abducted people to the underworld for all eternity, erasing them from existence. Which is exactly what happened to Alex’s parents. And we knew Alex would be next, because he’d seen the Ghost Rider. We headed for the Sheriff’s Station. Except Alex was already gone. [ Stiles stops walking, all the nervous energy in his body now channeled instead through the hand in Itachi’s. ] The police had no idea who Alex was. No records of him. No memories. We couldn’t save him.
[It isn't the time or place to criticize those people in Stiles' life back home, although the desire nags at him, distaste for the treatment the boy faces by those he would call his companions. As always, Synchrony paints a truer color of feeling. Though he may have the urge for correction—Stiles is not as they may see him—it won't be heard well now. So he waits, and continues to listen.
The souls of the dead hunt the living. It's clear to him that Stiles was targeted, but the method does not appear to be immediate. If these supernatural creatures are so powerful, why do they bide their time in selecting a victim and snatching them up? Either time is what they require to be successful... or, perhaps more sinister, they enjoy the hunt. Itachi has met men of such an inclination; he would not put it beyond the whim of these Ghost Riders, although he knows too little yet to make the assumption.
Part of this is to walk Stiles through the trauma of what had occurred to him, another is to give Itachi as many pieces of the mystery as possible. He could have taken these memories straight from the boy's head, but that would not have offered the same relief of speaking the words aloud. Being heard as he was not heard so many weeks ago. Outside the issue that they can be sent home at all, bereft of the memory of these dimensions, is the problem that Stiles now faces: he does not have a home to return to. Like Itachi, he is facing the fate of a dead end. One much less deserved than his own.
Their walk slows, then stops, leading Itachi to step around in front of him. His free hand finds its place on Stiles' shoulder.]
[ The story is coming to a close. They both know how it ends. Lost in thought now, Stiles remains eerily silent as he replays those final moments in his head. But then a body moves to stand in front of him, interrupting the view of a seemingly unending path that tunnels his glassy vision to nowhere. Shaken free from the rabbit hole that he was unconsciously tumbling down, he starts in muted surprise. The sight of Itachi, solid and real and present, quells the spark of wild fear trying to ignite in his breast. But still the seeds of grief linger, exacerbated by the unearthed memories he’s tried so hard not to dwell on since returning to Noctium. ]
Me and Scott…we went back to the school, to warn everyone about the Ghost Riders. We split up to cover more ground. [ A pause. Brown eyes begin to shine behind a wall of unshed tears. ] That’s the last time –
[ He reaches up, scrubbing at his face with a trembling hand. ]
No one recognized me. Not Lydia’s mom. Not Liam, Hayden, or Mason. And then…
[ Looking away from Itachi, he gazes at some point in the distance while trying to dam the flood of anguish welling up in his heart. The tears spill down his cheeks, only to be angrily wiped at seconds later. ]
My dad, [ Stiles croaks miserably, voice breaking. ] He was there. He had…no idea who I was. I was a complete stranger to him. My own dad. It was like something out of my worst nightmare. I called Scott, but when Scott picked up, he didn’t know me anymore either. So, I knew then. It was obvious. The Ghost Riders were coming for me.
[ A shiver born from deep within his soul crawls upwards out of him. Stiles glances back at Itachi, the line of his mouth wobbling. ]
Lydia was the only one who still remembered. We ran, but the Ghost Riders were surrounding us. She couldn’t see them. I was afraid that, if we kept trying to escape, they might let her see them. That she might be next. I told her she was going to forget who I was, but that she had to try and remember me. I t-told her…I told her to remember that I love her. And then they took me. There was a flash of lightning, this weird feeling in my gut, and then…nothing.
[ He searches Itachi desperately for some kind of reassurance – reassurance that he’s not even emotionally equipped to tolerate, so ironclad is his belief that he’s doomed. ]
I woke up in the Burnished Crater. After I got back to Sumarlok, I…went to see you.
[The grief is an ocean bleeding through that empathetic tether, crashing over rocks, tunneling along the well-worn grooves of their familiar connection. He can feel the pain in Stiles' confession—those final moments of unrecognition from his father—as though that pain is his own. The sensitivity he has to Stiles' emotions is no new experience. Over time it has heightened, his detachment eroded by the Bond and even further by Synchrony, binding him closely to every hitch and hiccup in Stiles' emotional world. Every hurt, hurts one another. Every pleasure is compounded. Perhaps it is some masochistic thing, to be this attached to another person that he might move entire worlds in the effort to ease some of the suffering he feels in Stiles now. That he had ever considered they could live apart. That he would go to the ends of his ability to fix this problem, and that he despises himself with restored vitriol for what he did when Stiles came to see him.
That he would unleash himself upon these supernatural creatures, the Ghost Riders, at any cost, if only he could.
Itachi extracts his hand upon the story's conclusion, but only to lift both arms and enfold the boy in an embrace. One not unlike what he had offered after his transformation in the mountains. In the shade they stand together, a little off from the path, and he doesn't move, grasp strong enough that Stiles will have to fight him if he wishes it to loosen. A warm cheek presses in against the side of the boy's head.]
I am sorry. [His voice is quiet, low, nearly lost.] You came for comfort and I was cruel. I suppose, often, it is easier for me to be that way. I was wrong. It is not the first time.
[How Stiles has managed to fish him out of his own head and anchor him into the world... he doesn't know, but he expects there are too many others who would be more worth that brilliant, tenacious devotion. Not a man like him, who cannot seem to interact with reality in a way that is not painfully debilitating—every sharp, jagged edge of his psyche is designed like a weapon to turn against an opponent. Of course Stiles would suffer from it.]
You deserve someone better, but I fear that I wouldn't allow it now, even if you never forgive me. [Even if Lydia, who the Stiles of another world loves, tried to take him back.] When I believed you were gone... It was difficult. I was not prepared for that feeling, and it ultimately affected my judgment.
[A sick, dark plunge off a cliff, too similar to his initial glimpses of his family's curse in childhood.]
Stiles, you are the only good part of any life I have ever had, before or after. I understand you're afraid. It's all right. [He keeps his voice even, slow and deliberate, picking words with precision.] You are here, and so am I. Will you bear with that for now?
[ Warm, capable arms cradle him – inviting Stiles to weather the storm of his raw emotions, to be weak in the shelter of Itachi’s steady strength. He quits trying to compartmentalize his overwhelming grief; breath hitching, the teenager begins to quietly weep against a shoulder, tears soon drenching the fabric of the shirt that Itachi wears. He thinks of the father he may never see again, a bloody hole in the shape of Noah Stilinski scarring his heart. Nothing has been crueler than this terrible fate. But somehow even worse yet is the ever-looming possibility of losing Itachi, whether to disease or the mercurial whims of these dimensions. It seems inevitable, as if Stiles is doomed to watch all his loved ones pass beyond his reach again and again.
He can still count on one hand the number of times that his boyfriend has embraced him like this. The rarity of the gesture wrings him inside out. When the shinobi speaks, the tender words murmured against his ear become the lifeline to which he painstakingly tethers himself. Were it only possible, he would bind their souls together in a union more complete and intimate than matrimony. He cannot imagine a future without Itachi anymore. He has no desire to. This unhealthy codependency upon each other has reached culmination.
And so, Stiles recognizes the true meaning lurking beneath the surface of Itachi’s speech now. It’s as fulfilling as an explicit confession – Itachi is in love with him. ]
St-stay with me, [ he begs hoarsely, clinging for his life’s worth to the slender, lean body that’s more weapon than man. ] I don’t care about an-anyone “better.” I just need you. Nothing else matters.
[ Trembling, Stiles slips his arms around Itachi’s neck. ]
C-can…can we go home?
[ Home. Not in Beacon Hills, but a quiet suburban neighborhood in the Emerald District – where Sophia patiently waits and the old t-shirt of Itachi’s lies buried within his pillowcase. ]
[He can feel the warm tears begin to saturate his shirt, hiccups devolving into sobs that shake the boy's frame in the aftermath of hurt—he doesn't move until those grief-stricken tremors become littler shivers, and Stiles begins to ease, at least partially, into his hold. The arms are loose around his throat; he enjoys the simple warmth of their shared embrace in a way he has not experienced since early childhood, when exchanges of affection were still permitted between himself and Sasuke. It doesn't feel unnatural. He wonders why he'd ever begun to avoid this.
Well... he knows.
Yet it's the easiest decision in the world, answering that question. It shouldn't be, because the gravity of the word home cannot be understated, and he has never thought of this world as that. Aefenglom was not home. Hell was not home. To him, home existed in a place he would never reach—in a corner of the village hidden in the leaves, haunted by ghosts.
But now, it makes perfect sense for him to consider Stiles' request as an exception. An addendum. This world isn't home, either, but the boy in his arms is the closest he may ever get to it again, and wherever he is, Itachi will go. So he turns, gently beginning to steer them in the direction of that house.]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
They remerge in the harsh sunlight, beyond the considerate coverage of leafy tree canopies. Late summer heat beats down on his body, ruthless. Stiles doesn’t spare a thought for the elements, however; he’s mulling over how to provide all the limited information he has on the Ghost Riders. ]
I’ll start from the beginning. [ Still tense, but lacking the dangerous edge from before. ] We were investigating a weird case. A car rolling down the road without anyone driving it, some kid named Alex in the backseat begging not to let “them” take him. He can’t remember anything and his parents are nowhere to be found. Scott, the werewolf alpha of my pack, uses his powers to watch the kid’s memories. Scott says he sees a guy on a horse with a gun. Sounds like more of my dad’s wheelhouse – y’know, a regular, non-supernatural crime that the police should handle. But I had a feeling. See, I timed Scott while he was in Alex’s head. Four minutes passed. Four minutes, and all he sees is a guy on a horse? No way. Something doesn’t add up.
We check out the car. Lydia – she’s a banshee, so she can sense the dead – says the parents didn’t die. She would know. Our resident werecoyote, Malia, can’t scent the parents at all. They chalk it up to a coincidence, claim I’m just looking to make a normal case supernatural when it’s not. [ There’s frustration evident in his body language even now; Stiles has had a lifetime of not being believed. ] Well, I notice something. The windshield. Other car windshields that’ve been shot at…the impact is like a ripple, right? The bullet hits, then creates spiderweb cracks through the glass. Not this car. The windshield is totally blown out. I start thinking that the suspect used a kind of magic bullet and grab a shard of the windshield. It’s coated in a blue powder.
Next day. My dad’s people searched the car; didn’t find any slugs from the bullet, or an exit hole in the windshield. And the home address that Alex, that kid, gave them? Leads to an abandoned house. Nothing makes sense. But no one’s taking me or the case seriously.
You still following?
no subject
Stiles manages to rein himself back in, however, and the story starts.
The names are familiar. He knows Scott by now as someone that allowed Stiles to be beaten black and blue in a basement unrescued; he knows Lydia as the one Stiles has confessed to being in love with, back home. The flicker over Synchrony is subtle, subdued by his own quiet and resilient self-control in the moment, but still there—a burn of dislike that resembles annoyance. Gone in a blink, like the hot blue center of a flame. Itachi adjusts their hands, threading fingers where they were only cupping before, knuckle over knuckle, palms now in fuller contact.
And again, Stiles' stubborn pursuit of the truth, his cleverness in puzzling out a problem unparalleled to so many. His friends not believing him. This, Itachi has witnessed firsthand, in the memory of Stiles at the library. Stiles and Scott, by the vehicle in the woods. His mouth forms a grim line.]
I'm surprised, that after so long, they still don't trust your instinct. [A mild comment as dark eyes follow their path ahead. The shade returns, trees concealing them overhead.] ... Yes, I'm following.
no subject
Scott never even apologized to him.
Bastard. ]
They think of me like a broken clock, [ he remarks grimly, jerking one shoulder in the approximation of a dismissive shrug. Synchrony betrays the gesture; Stiles cares about the opinions of the pack more than he cares to admit. ] “He’s right at least twice a day.” Any other time? I’m just an unreliable spaz to them.
[ The self-depreciating line of thinking doesn’t help him. Forcing himself to move beyond the tangent, he continues with the story. ]
I guess…it’s important for me to mention that weird stuff started happening to me around that time. Like, a form that I distinctly remember filling out to have my yearbook photo taken was suddenly blank. Later, no one told me we had lacrosse practice and some other guy was wearing my jersey. The same jersey that I’ve worn every year since starting school. It was already happening, and we had no idea. [ He swallows, throat clicking audibly. ] I was being erased from existence.
I convinced Scott to come with me and check out the house. Just like the police said, the place was totally abandoned. It seemed like no one had lived there for years. Dust everywhere. But I found one room that wasn’t like the rest. Alex’s bedroom. It looked totally normal, as if the kid really did live there. Then I saw the photos. He was the only one in them, even when it didn’t make sense for him to be. Just for example, Alex had his arm up in the middle of the air, hanging onto nothing. People were missing from the photos.
I checked under the bed. When I did, I saw hooves across the room on the other side. But when I stood up, nothing was there. I got a nasty feeling. Ran out of the room and shut the door behind me. And wouldn’t you know, there’s a guy who fits Scott’s description at the other end of the hall. One of the Ghost Riders.
[ A clammy sweat breaks out along his skin. Stiles weathers a shudder. ]
The thing shot at me a few times, but missed. Scott hears the commotion and comes running upstairs. The Ghost Rider is gone. I tell Scott that I was attacked, that I think the guy from Alex’s memory made the kid’s parents disappear. We open the bedroom to Alex’s bedroom – and all his stuff is gone. The room is as empty and abandoned as the rest of the house now.
Finally everyone’s taking it seriously. We start researching mass disappearances. Eventually, Lydia realizes what the Ghost Riders are – they’re part of the Wild Hunt, a popular myth. In the myth, the souls of the dead hunt the living. It was said that seeing the Wild Hunt was a bad omen, usually leading to some catastrophe or death. As for the Wild Hunt itself, they abducted people to the underworld for all eternity, erasing them from existence. Which is exactly what happened to Alex’s parents. And we knew Alex would be next, because he’d seen the Ghost Rider. We headed for the Sheriff’s Station. Except Alex was already gone. [ Stiles stops walking, all the nervous energy in his body now channeled instead through the hand in Itachi’s. ] The police had no idea who Alex was. No records of him. No memories. We couldn’t save him.
no subject
The souls of the dead hunt the living. It's clear to him that Stiles was targeted, but the method does not appear to be immediate. If these supernatural creatures are so powerful, why do they bide their time in selecting a victim and snatching them up? Either time is what they require to be successful... or, perhaps more sinister, they enjoy the hunt. Itachi has met men of such an inclination; he would not put it beyond the whim of these Ghost Riders, although he knows too little yet to make the assumption.
Part of this is to walk Stiles through the trauma of what had occurred to him, another is to give Itachi as many pieces of the mystery as possible. He could have taken these memories straight from the boy's head, but that would not have offered the same relief of speaking the words aloud. Being heard as he was not heard so many weeks ago. Outside the issue that they can be sent home at all, bereft of the memory of these dimensions, is the problem that Stiles now faces: he does not have a home to return to. Like Itachi, he is facing the fate of a dead end. One much less deserved than his own.
Their walk slows, then stops, leading Itachi to step around in front of him. His free hand finds its place on Stiles' shoulder.]
What happened after that?
no subject
Me and Scott…we went back to the school, to warn everyone about the Ghost Riders. We split up to cover more ground. [ A pause. Brown eyes begin to shine behind a wall of unshed tears. ] That’s the last time –
[ He reaches up, scrubbing at his face with a trembling hand. ]
No one recognized me. Not Lydia’s mom. Not Liam, Hayden, or Mason. And then…
[ Looking away from Itachi, he gazes at some point in the distance while trying to dam the flood of anguish welling up in his heart. The tears spill down his cheeks, only to be angrily wiped at seconds later. ]
My dad, [ Stiles croaks miserably, voice breaking. ] He was there. He had…no idea who I was. I was a complete stranger to him. My own dad. It was like something out of my worst nightmare. I called Scott, but when Scott picked up, he didn’t know me anymore either. So, I knew then. It was obvious. The Ghost Riders were coming for me.
[ A shiver born from deep within his soul crawls upwards out of him. Stiles glances back at Itachi, the line of his mouth wobbling. ]
Lydia was the only one who still remembered. We ran, but the Ghost Riders were surrounding us. She couldn’t see them. I was afraid that, if we kept trying to escape, they might let her see them. That she might be next. I told her she was going to forget who I was, but that she had to try and remember me. I t-told her…I told her to remember that I love her. And then they took me. There was a flash of lightning, this weird feeling in my gut, and then…nothing.
[ He searches Itachi desperately for some kind of reassurance – reassurance that he’s not even emotionally equipped to tolerate, so ironclad is his belief that he’s doomed. ]
I woke up in the Burnished Crater. After I got back to Sumarlok, I…went to see you.
no subject
That he would unleash himself upon these supernatural creatures, the Ghost Riders, at any cost, if only he could.
Itachi extracts his hand upon the story's conclusion, but only to lift both arms and enfold the boy in an embrace. One not unlike what he had offered after his transformation in the mountains. In the shade they stand together, a little off from the path, and he doesn't move, grasp strong enough that Stiles will have to fight him if he wishes it to loosen. A warm cheek presses in against the side of the boy's head.]
I am sorry. [His voice is quiet, low, nearly lost.] You came for comfort and I was cruel. I suppose, often, it is easier for me to be that way. I was wrong. It is not the first time.
[How Stiles has managed to fish him out of his own head and anchor him into the world... he doesn't know, but he expects there are too many others who would be more worth that brilliant, tenacious devotion. Not a man like him, who cannot seem to interact with reality in a way that is not painfully debilitating—every sharp, jagged edge of his psyche is designed like a weapon to turn against an opponent. Of course Stiles would suffer from it.]
You deserve someone better, but I fear that I wouldn't allow it now, even if you never forgive me. [Even if Lydia, who the Stiles of another world loves, tried to take him back.] When I believed you were gone... It was difficult. I was not prepared for that feeling, and it ultimately affected my judgment.
[A sick, dark plunge off a cliff, too similar to his initial glimpses of his family's curse in childhood.]
Stiles, you are the only good part of any life I have ever had, before or after. I understand you're afraid. It's all right. [He keeps his voice even, slow and deliberate, picking words with precision.] You are here, and so am I. Will you bear with that for now?
no subject
He can still count on one hand the number of times that his boyfriend has embraced him like this. The rarity of the gesture wrings him inside out. When the shinobi speaks, the tender words murmured against his ear become the lifeline to which he painstakingly tethers himself. Were it only possible, he would bind their souls together in a union more complete and intimate than matrimony. He cannot imagine a future without Itachi anymore. He has no desire to. This unhealthy codependency upon each other has reached culmination.
And so, Stiles recognizes the true meaning lurking beneath the surface of Itachi’s speech now. It’s as fulfilling as an explicit confession – Itachi is in love with him. ]
St-stay with me, [ he begs hoarsely, clinging for his life’s worth to the slender, lean body that’s more weapon than man. ] I don’t care about an-anyone “better.” I just need you. Nothing else matters.
[ Trembling, Stiles slips his arms around Itachi’s neck. ]
C-can…can we go home?
[ Home. Not in Beacon Hills, but a quiet suburban neighborhood in the Emerald District – where Sophia patiently waits and the old t-shirt of Itachi’s lies buried within his pillowcase. ]
/fin
Well... he knows.
Yet it's the easiest decision in the world, answering that question. It shouldn't be, because the gravity of the word home cannot be understated, and he has never thought of this world as that. Aefenglom was not home. Hell was not home. To him, home existed in a place he would never reach—in a corner of the village hidden in the leaves, haunted by ghosts.
But now, it makes perfect sense for him to consider Stiles' request as an exception. An addendum. This world isn't home, either, but the boy in his arms is the closest he may ever get to it again, and wherever he is, Itachi will go. So he turns, gently beginning to steer them in the direction of that house.]
Of course.