Resisting Temptation (A Kyoya Ootori Fanfic)

Chapter 23

Chapter warning - emotional trauma, mild violence and reference to crime

(Seina's POV)
I woke up from the nightmare with my heart thundering in my chest. It was the millionth time I had endured the same dream and I'd stopped hoping it would go away. But this time was different. I opened my eyes to a pitch black room. Fighting my rising panic I reached out to the bedside lamp but my hand struck air. When I touched nothing again I began to scream. It was real. I was back in that horrible, terrible place. Once I began screaming I couldn't stop. Somewhere near by I could hear voices and pounding footsteps but they seemed so far away. They were coming for me. I curled up as small as I could, my hands over my ears and my eyes screwed up so tight it hurt as the hysteria threatened to drown me. Still I couldn't stop screaming. I couldn't stop.

(Tatsuo's POV)
I hadn't been asleep long when I was awoken by an awful, jarring shriek. A scream which cut through the night and continued on and on. I yanked back the covers of my bed, grateful I'd worn shorts to bed even in the height of summer. I pulled on a t-shirt as I came crashing out of my chambers and nearly knocked my mother off her feet. Seina was still screaming. There was no world in which I would forget that sound, or the months during which it had become the soundtrack of nighttime in our home.
I rushed into her chambers and through to the bedroom. Ootori was standing a couple of paces from the bed, staring at Seina wide eyed while her maid desperately tried to soothe her. When she saw me enter, my mother quick on my heels she moved back a respectable distance and allowed us to take over. I sat down on the bed and put my arm around my little sister, my mother doing the same on her other side. By now her voice was raw from screaming, her faced red from sobbing and her nightgown soaked in sweat.
'It's ok Seina. You're ok. It's not real. Your safe.' Again and again we chanted the same words to her as her screams faded to broken sobs and she finally began to calm down. I gestured to the maid to bring a clean nightgown and carefully let go of Seina, allowing my mother to take control. I looked around the room for the source of her panic attack, they hadn't been so bad for years. The main lights were on but the bedside lamps were not...in fact hers was missing, a laptop charging in its place. Seina was muttering under her breath at this stage about darkness without the sun, rubbing at her wrists again and again where she'd once been bloody from rope burn.
Ootori look grief stricken as he watched her gradually pulling back together again. I examined the unfamiliar laptop. Not Seina's. Then I noticed the pillows forming a broken wall across the bed. After that it took me less than a second to work out what had happened and swing my fist into Ootori's face.
He did not try to defend himself and I found myself roaring at him. 'You bastard! Look at her! Look at what you did to my little sister! She is in this state because you unplugged her lamp to charge your god damn laptop! What is wrong with you!? You selfish, good for nothing-'
'Tatsuo! Please.' I blinked as I realised Seina had got up and was now stood between me and Ootori, sobbing with her shaking hands held out in front of her. I probably would have hit Ootori again but for her I steadied myself and took a deep breath. I then wrapped my arms tightly around her as she seemed to collapse into me, whatever strength she'd regained gone. I stroked her hair and began chanting all over again as she sobbed into my chest.
'It's ok Seina. You're ok. It's not real. You're safe.' It was then I noticed Satsuki stood in the doorway, bleary eyed and wearing a long black shirt, a bloody skull on the front. We exchanged a nod and I looked around the room again. The maid was tearfully apologising to my mother for not checking on Seina or whatever else she thought she'd done wrong. My mother was barely paying attention her eyes on Seina. Thankfully Satsuki seemed to detect what was needed without being asked and led the shell shocked Ootori from the room to the Hitachiin twins beyond.

(Kaoru's POV)
We gave Kyoya-senpai an appraising look as Satsuki led him from Seina's chambers by his elbow. He didn't protest or try to shake her off as we all traipsed down the stairs to her rooms. Without a word Satsuki sat him in an armchair in her sitting area, sinking into the other herself while we took the couch. He buried his face in his hands.
Satsuki's face hardened. 'What happened?' It was a command not a question.
He shook his head. 'I don't know. Everything was fine. I was working at the desk when she went to bed and she was fast asleep when I joined her a couple of hours later.'
Satsuki made a disapproving face. 'She invited you into her bed for the first time and you sent her to sleep by herself!?'
Me and Hikaru nodded our agreement. 'Not husband material.' We declared in unison.
Kyoya glared at us half heartedly. 'I went to sleep and the next thing I knew I was awoken by her screaming. God, I thought someone was murdering her the way she was screaming. I tried to talk to her, snap her out of it but she just couldn't hear me. Then the maid came running in and turned the lights on and I got out of her way. Then Seina's mother and brother came running in. Then Tatsuo-kun hit me. Now I'm here.'
Satsuki summoned a maid who brought an ice pack for Kyoya's face before continuing her interrogation.  'Did Tatsuo say anything before he hit you?'
A humourless laugh from Kyoya. 'Oh yes. He made it quite clear that this is all my fault because I unplugged her lamp to charge my laptop.'
Me and Hikaru exchanged a look. 'Kyoya-senpai, we thought you knew, Seina is afraid of the dark.'
'I did know! I just...I didn't think...and now she is hurting again because of me. She looked so utterly broken and I did that.'
Satsuki's response was harsh. 'Don't be so full of yourself. You did not break her, you had a good go but she is fine. This is about something that like most things in this world has nothing to do with you.'
'The incident in her childhood.'
This time I looked to Satsuki, anger still glittering dangerously in her eyes. 'We have to tell him now don't we?' Kyoya was watching carefully as we spoke, his curiosity and desire for knowledge temporarily overcoming his misery, but Satsuki shook her head firmly.
'It is Seina's story to tell and no one else's. He can be a man and ask her when she has recovered or die not knowing.' Her tone left none of us in doubt as to which option she was in favour of.