Flightless Bird

S2: Chapter 2: For tonight

War's POV

As the door clicked shut behind Yin, a heavy silence settled over the room.

I sat there, staring at the spot where he had been just moments before, the air still charged with the intensity of our exchange.

My mind was a whirlpool of emotions, each thought colliding with the next, making it hard to breathe.

Damn it, why does he always manage to get under my skin?

I shook my head, trying to dispel the echoes of his voice that lingered in my ears.

It was infuriating how easily he could provoke me, how effortlessly he could peel away the layers of armor Id painstakingly built around myself.

But this was just old history playing tricks on my mind.

Yin was my past.

Long gone, irrelevant.

I had my future mapped out without him in it.

I stood up and limped across the room to the window, staring out at the city skyline.

The lights twinkled like stars, indifferent to my turmoil.

Leaning against the cool glass, I clenched my fists, nails digging into my palms.

This was ridiculous.

I'm War.

I didnt have time for these trivial emotions, didnt have time to be haunted by a ghost from my past.

But as much as I wanted to dismiss it, the memory of Yin's eyes, the way they had looked at me, pierced through my defenses.

He always had that infuriating ability.

And the worst part? There was a part of me that craved it, that missed the way he made me feel alive.

No.

I couldnt afford to think like that.

Yin was a distraction, a complication I didnt need.

This was just residual nostalgia, remnants of a past life that no longer had any bearing on who I was now.

I forced myself to focus on the present, on the plans I had to execute, the battles I had to fight.

There was no room for Yin in that equation.

He had chosen his path, and I had chosen mine.

They diverged long ago, and there was no going back.

Still, as the night wore on and the city fell into a hush, I couldnt shake the feeling that something had shifted.

Yin's presence had stirred up things I thought Id buried deep.

But there was too much at stake to let old wounds resurface, too much to lose if I allowed myself to feel.

So I stood there, in the quiet of my room, convincing myself that the pang in my chest was just a fleeting discomfort.

That the memories of Yin were just shadows of a bygone era.

And that, above all, I didnt still have feelings for him.

I didnt. I couldnt. I wouldnt.

_____

Yin's POV

As I walked through the front door of my house, the familiar scent of jasmine and the soft hum of music greeted me.

The tension from my encounter with War began to dissipate as I entered the warm, inviting space that Aom and I shared.

This was home, and Aom was my future.