The Custodes

Chapter 7 - Confessions and Comas

"Quinn, there's something I want to tell you." Nexus said just as the girl walked into her apartment, with him following inside and closing the door behind him. The walk home had been relatively uneventful, but the two had a small chat about a few topics, one being Daigo and the extent of Nexus' friendship with him, since Quinn had failed to grasp the concept repeatedly over the years the trio had known each other. Although they hadn't discussed it further, the memory Nexus had seen in the restaurant was still at the back of his mind, lingering there like a constant itch doing all it can to make his night a bad one. He refused to let it, yet occasionally found this thoughts unavoidably drifting towards it. He knew exactly what it was of course, he'd never forgotten a single detail about the event as a whole, but it was something he wasn't ever planning on sharing with anyone. If what Quinn had said about the spell was the truth, then she hadn't actually seen the memory herself, which was a huge relief to him. What she'd told him also explained why it was that exact memory that had showed up. She claimed the spell was drawn to memories with especially strong emotions, and Nexus couldn't think of anything else in his life even coming remotely close to the thoughts and feelings surrounding that one memory. None of them were positive, of course. Guilt, regret, and outright sadness were the main ones, and every time the thought of it entered his mind those emotions came flooded right back with it. So, he focused on putting it to the back of his mind, and talking to Quinn had turned out to be an excellent way of doing so. "Yeah? What is it?" She asked, turning to look at him with a curious expression. She wasn't quite sure what to expect, making a big deal out of simply telling her something was pretty out of the blue for Nexus. "Lets sit on your couch." He said, hoping to relieve some of the tension building about what he wanted to say, but it seemed it only managed to up Quinn's confusion and wonder. She didn't deny it however, instead giving a small nod and moving over to sit on her living room couch, with him setting himself down beside her. "You're making this out to be something important. I'm only slightly on edge." Quinn said, watching him carefully as he managed a small smile "It's nothing too huge, just...I've figured it's about time you knew." He told her, making her brow furrow very slightly, but overall she seemed to be waiting for him to speak. "The black haired kid, the one that took on Zuro and I asked you to find for me?" He started, looking at her to make sure she was aware of who he was talking about. "Uh huh. What about him?" She asked, not having the slightest clue where the conversation was going. "He's my younger brother." Nexus stated, watching her carefully to try and see how she feels about it. "Your younger-...but I thought that-.....I don't understand." She looked at him quizzically, trying to find any hint of humour on his face that would let her know he's making some sick joke. In finding none, her eyes widened slightly as she started to consider the possibility "You've told me you were an only child plenty of times in the past. And-...and if it were true why didn't you say anything when you wanted me to find him." Numerous questions started flying through her head, and it seemed she couldn't quite figure out which one to ask first. "Relax, I'll explain it all." Nexus said as he watched her, meeting her surprised gaze for a second before she slowly closed her mouth and quietened down, waiting for him to speak first. "His name is Neo, he's seventeen, and I grew up with him for most of my younger years. I told you a while ago I was an orphan and that wasn't a lie. Me and Neo grew up in an orphanage since birth, and neither of us have ever met our parents, but we stuck by each other in our childhood and ending up learning how to control our powers together. Eventually we used them to escape the orphanage and went on to live together in the outside world. It was difficult, I'll be honest with you, and trying to make an honest living as a homeless kid was about as easy as you'd think. So, you can guess where I turned. Me and Neo were pretty well off, even managed to buy a scummy little apartment together, pretty similar to the one he's living in now. After a while the kid started to get curious about where I was getting such large amounts of money from, and once he discovered the true source he wanted me out of his life. There was no point in trying to reason with him, so I moved on. I found out where he lived a while ago but I decided to leave him be, and I've never looked back since." Nexus finished off his story with the slightest shrug, looking away as he thought back to the past life he lived with his brother. Quinn watched Nexus, trying her best to keep her emotions contained as she listened to the story. "He left you just because you stole? Doesn't he realise it was only because you were desperate to help the both of you?" She asked quietly, trying to get any sort of answers from him about it. "Like I said, there was no point in trying to explain myself. He'd made up his mind and I respected his wishes, and now look where we are. He's off fighting tyrannical mad men and I'm sitting comfortably at the top of a rather successful criminal organisation." Nexus said, leaning back on the couch slightly. "But doesn't it upset you? Having to leave him like you did?" Quinn asked, wanting to hear his true thoughts on everything. "For a while, I can safely say I was pretty torn up about us having to separate, but then I slowly worked on removing him from my mind, and my life entirely. I have no brotherly compassion towards him now, all of it has been left in the past. He's just a boy, a horribly naive one who's looking at a very short lifespan if he continues the way he is." Nexus said completely truthfully, glancing away from Quinn as he saw her expression changed to a slightly more shocked one. "I didn't think you would be so heartless about it." She said, prompting him to let out a small sigh. "Aren't you the one who criticises Daigo on a daily basis for being soft?" He fired back at her, seriously disliking how this conversation was turning out. "That's different. Daigo's like that all around, but this is your family Nex. Your only family, at that." Quinn said, frowning slightly as she looked at him. "You can't force me to care about him." He stated firmly, rubbing his forehead as her mouth fell open slightly. "I never said that's what I was trying to do!" She shouted defensively, before realising her outburst and quieting herself "I just want to understand your feelings for him. It seems so hard to believe that you'd be so okay with him being killed." "If you want my complete honestly, it'd be a relief on my part. Then I could stop anticipating when we'll cross paths next." Nexus said coldly, looking over at Quinn and meeting her calmer, composed gaze. "I understand." She said, before trying to think of something else to ask him "You said you were both left in an orphanage, yet somehow you knew you were brothers. How?" Nexus looked down in thought at the question for a second, then gave a small shrug of his shoulders "I'm honestly not sure. It feels like we just sort of always knew it. Maybe it was cause we were both dumped in the orphanage at the same time or something, I don't really know. Must've been too young to remember." Quinn watched him for a second, then furrowed her brow "Nex, that doesn't make sense." "What?" "You two getting dumped in the orphanage at the same time. You said he's seventeen, so there's two years between the two of you, but you also said you were both abandoned at birth." Nexus frowned at this, then quickly shook his head and spoke "No, that's-...that shouldn't-..." He paused, staring down as he considered this. Why hadn't he thought about that before? He tried everything he could to think back to his first few days at the orphanage, but he didn't have any sort of recollection of it at all. It felt like there was some sort of mental block there, and all he could remember was that he and Neo had always been together and that the fact they were brothers was simply a given. That was the truth, Nexus knew that for certain. He didn't know why, and there wasn't much justification for it, but the thought that it wasn't true was out of the question. Still though, what Quinn had said was peculiar to him, and he could only think of one explanation. "It must've been the staff. Once Neo arrived at the orphanage, they must've told us we were brothers. Sums up my parents pretty perfectly. What kind of fucking people leave one kid in an orphanage, then dump a second kid in the same orphanage two years later?" Nexus said, scowling as he silently cursed whoever his parents were to the ends of the earth. "Lets move on from this topic." Quinn said quietly, sensing Nexus' anger before he took a deep breath and calmed down, turning to look at her. "You're right. I'm sorry, I just figured it was about time I told you. I never mentioned it when we first met and then just figured it wasn't necessary for you to know." He said truthfully, which put a small smile on her face "Well, it certainly is a good thing to know. Though I'm curious...what changed?" "Well, I um..." Nexus thought for a second, not quite sure what he was going to say to that. What had changed? He didn't quite know, all he knew was that he suddenly felt closer to Quinn and that withholding that kind of information from her didn't sit right with him. Maybe it was because he'd never spent proper time with her before. God dammit. She'd actually managed to get through his defences. After so much persistence he finally let her have what she wanted, and in doing so let his guard drop for the night. Could that mean feelings for her were forming? No. Not at all. The feelings had always been there, he knew that now. Spending time with her had only caused those feelings to start shining through, something he was actually fairly worried about. For all the time they'd been friends he'd done everything he could to stop himself from expressing much emotion towards her, but now he could actively feel all his mental barriers breaking down. It was fine. He'd just have to put them all up again and that would be that. If he started openly caring about her now of all times, with Zuro suddenly entering the picture, things would most definitely end badly. He couldn't let that happen. He cared about her too much. Dammit. There it was again. "...I just figured you've opened up to me quite a bit recently so I should pay you back a little." "I think I'll accept that answer." Quinn said, letting out a small chuckle "Speaking of opening up..." She grew quiet yet again, suddenly turning serious as her sentence trailed off. "What? You have something you want to say?" Nexus asked her, raising an eyebrow as he watched her curiously. "Not so much say, just...talk about. I take it back, it's completely pointless, lets think of something else." She said, seriously hoping that Nexus will agree to just move on, but it appeared he wasn't exactly willing to do so "No, tell me, I want to hear it." "No you don't Nex, it'll just make things fucking uncomfortable around us again and I don't want that." She told him, shaking her head. "You've told me all about your feelings for me, admitted to tricking me on a date, and gotten me to kiss you even though it meant nothing. What could possibly be-" "Fine. If you want to hear it that bad then...fine. But whatever comes of it - whatever you think about it - you're the one who pushed me." She said, crossing her arms as Nexus gave a small nod, accepting the consequences. His mind was running wild as he tried to figure out what it was she had to say, but he figured the best course of action was staying quiet and letting her talk. She turned to look at him on the couch, then let out a quiet breath and began speaking "I didn't exactly...go into extreme detail about what happened when you appeared here all mangled and-...anyway, I just thought for some fucking stupid reason that I wanted to tell you and now here we are. Cause the truth is, when I saw you I-" she paused, biting her cheek slightly as Nexus stared at her with curious surprise "I almost couldn't take it. I thought you were dead and the thought alone was so fucking scary, Nex." He noticed that her lip was trembling slightly, which surprised him more than the story itself. Was she seriously that close to breaking down simply by telling the story? "Still, I did everything I could. I didn't know if it would all be in vain or not, but I tried anyway. I-I-...I was so worried I'd lose you that I refused to give up. Eventually though, my body did. And that's when the crying started. It's a good thing I called an ambulance before I started healing you cause I was in no state to do so afterwards." It was very faint, but there appeared to be a slight shake in Quinn's voice as she spoke, though other than that she sounded strangely calm "The paramedics came in and found me freaking out on the floor next to you covered in your blood. They helped me out while simultaneously trying to get you into the ambulance to bring you to a hospital, but I refused to leave your side. Even when the building was under attack. I didn't want to let you out of my sight until I knew you were gonna live. Eventually I managed to calm down, and figured out that with the amount of healing I did I probably didn't actually need to bring you to a hospital. It's a good thing I composed myself before you woke up." Nexus started at her for a few seconds then opened his mouth to say something in thinking she was finished, but he was cut off by her continuing to speak "None of that is the worst part though. The worst part is the shit I started to think about because of it." She sniffed quietly, and that was when he saw tears starting to build up in her eyes "I released how attached to you I really am. Sometimes it feels like...you're the only constant in my life. I have practically no one, a few friends here and there and even a couple of people I've fooled around with, but I know they aren't gonna stick around forever. I don't know why I think you will either, I just do. And I despise thinking like this cause-...cause-..." Tears began sliding down Quinn's cheeks, and that was when Nexus really became uncertain. It was so uncharacteristic of her that he was stunned into pure silence, only able to stare as she tried desperately to compose herself, failing miserably. "...I know you don't feel the same. Or rather, I know you won't let yourself feel the same. It's horrible. I know full well that if it were the other way around you wouldn't react nearly as badly as I had. And nothing I'm saying is going to change what you think!" She raised her voice now, and despite the fact that she was directing everything to Nexus it didn't look like she was able to do much as glance at him "I could end up dead tomorrow and you wouldn't even care! It'd just be another weight off your shoulders cause then you wouldn't have to worry about accidentally letting yourself feel something towards me! And I should hate you for it! I should hate you with all my heart, and scream and shout and fight because you act so bloody heartless towards me!" She practically screamed at him, then turned her head and looked him straight in the eyes. He gazed right back into hers, trying to keep the most solemn expression that he could, but it faltered, letting her see all the emotions he was attempting to suppress beneath it. Slowly Quinn's breathing slowed and became far less shaky, as she used her palms to wipe some of the ruined and tear stained makeup off her face "But I don't...I don't hate you Nex." She said, looking at him yet again "Look at you right now. You're sat on the same couch as a girl who's crying and screaming her lungs out, yet you won't so much as put a hand on her shoulder to comfort her."  Nexus's hand twitched slightly, moving forward almost as though it was about to reach out to her, but it stopped, an action which Quinn noticed and even let out a small, hurting laugh at "I should hate you for that...but I never will." She grew quiet now, staring down at the floor as Nexus looked at her emotionlessly. Inside however, his mind was at war with itself. He should do what she wants, comfort her any way he can since he knows full well it's what she's hoping he'll do. But his body wouldn't move. He didn't so much as mutter a word to her, yet he didn't quite know why. In his head, he knew secretly that he wanted to be there for her, but something was stopping him from doing so. He realised that it was the result of doing all he could over the years to become a cold, hardened man so that no one could ever use anything against him. He'd gotten so used to putting up all his barriers that even now, when he willed them to go away, they remained purely by default. Without looking at him Quinn stood up, and began talking quietly "I need to clean the mess I've made of my face. After that I-...I think it's time to call it a night. You can go. I won't force you to stay here, and I won't hold it against you either. I don't even want you to say anything to me. Thank you for the night, I-...fuck, I don't even know what happens after this...I'm rambling. Goodnight Nexus." She walked past him without so much as glancing in his direction, then moved to enter the bathroom so she could clean her face. Now was his last chance to say or do anything, if he was going to tell Quinn his true thoughts it had to be at that exact moment. Yet still, part of him refused to. Slowly he stood up and walked towards the door, opening it and staring out into the hallway of the apartment building. All it took was that moment of hesitation between opening the door and stepping outside to allow him to have a small moment of reflection. He thought of everything Quinn had said to him that night, and the debate he had been having in his head the entire time about letting any kind of feelings out in front of her. Slowly, one by one, he felt his mental barriers begin to break down, like a string of dominoes falling to allow a straight, clear path to appear.