Chapter Text
In hindsight, this whole mess could have been avoided if Ajax had only listened to his master’s rather peaceful order to go home.
And maybe, in another world, he would have. He’d have bowed to his master, saying no words to relay his gratitude because that’s how much she’d understood him, and went his merry way into the portal where the merciless winter of Snezhnaya would be waiting for him.
Where his family would be waiting for him, welcoming him with loving hugs and warm milk because they couldn’t afford the good cocoa sold on Saturday markets.
However, one look at his hands—the callouses that had formed from tightly gripping his sword, the scrapes on his palms, the bents in some of his fingers from how much they’d been broken—made something click in his mind.
The greedy part of him, the one that had always resided in his heart and reared its ugly head whenever he’d spot families wearing much more layers than his did, told him this:
You could have more.
Like the child he’d been, the child he still is, who’d ached for more, Ajax had believed it.
Skirk had only a second to catch the bright blue glow to the tips of his fingers before she was forced to parry his attack.
He’d seen how her eyes had widened for a moment before they steeled into something tougher, something dangerous, and he knew then that he’d either beat her once and for all or get dragged, kicking and screaming, to the ominously-glowing portal
Ajax might have been a tad too confident this round.
.
..
…
..
.
His hands still shake from the remnants of electro.
He swears loudly, uncaring of his surroundings that were distinctly missing the one element that made Snezhnaya, well, Snezhnaya.
Snezhnaya, which he definitely isn’t at, judging by the crisp green and orange leaves of the trees littering the whole area.
Great.
His stomach rumbles.
Just fucking great.
The only thing Ajax is honestly grateful for is that it’s night, meaning that it would be easier for him to sneak through in case there were any enemies loitering the place.
Yet, to his suspicion, nothing comes by his path as he makes his trek through the eerily quiet forest. He’s five seconds away from being convinced that this might be a dream before he catches something interesting.
Something destructive.
Instinctively, his spine straightens at the scent of smoke, reminded of the time Tonia had tried cooking unsupervised and nearly burned the house down.
Before he knows it, Ajax is running towards the origin, trusting his senses to guide him. In his haste, he passes by a group of hydro slimes that he decides to spare for now. This is more important.
He comes to a stop by those annoyingly striped trees, right in front of a clearing that had definitely seen better days.
Long stretches of grasses are on fire, several patches of blackened grass here and there, and hardly anything salvageable. He notices a group of trees having been burned down with a body on the ground just a few meters away, and it takes but a few seconds for him to connect the dots.
A Pyro Vision Holder had done this. One with a vendetta, he internally claims, eyeing the utter destruction that seemed to be emotional. Or, at least, emotional because of the dead body at the side.
Were any member of his family here, Ajax would have definitely scurried along with them to somewhere safer, to somewhere with people so they could notify them of the body.
But this wasn’t Snezhnaya, where people could freeze to death if they weren’t careful, and his family wasn’t here.
He’s alone.
Without Skirk this time.
Truly alone.
And so, because he’s alone, Ajax grabs a nearby stick. One with a pretty little flower blooming at the edge, probably days away from becoming a fruit, and goes to poke the body with it.
“Huh,” Ajax mutters, having never seen somebody like this.
For one, this person is wearing significantly fewer layers of clothing than normal that’s sadly torn at many places, but that could be attributed to the warmer climate. And two—
He’s wearing an eyepatch, what the fuck.
Curious, since the person’s dead and it’s not like he cares, he reaches out to slip his fingers underneath the blood-soaked eyepatch.
He gets the biggest fucking surprise of his life when the body’s other eye, the one that isn’t covered, opens.
For a moment, Ajax has a staring contest with the dead-but-not-really-man.
It’s only broken when the man looks away and closes his eyes.
Ajax is snapped out of his internal screaming by a rather wet cough from the man.
As he waits for the man to obviously ask him for help that he could cash in later, Ajax inspects the man’s current condition.
Yeah, he nods his head, proud of his original assessment. Somebody was trying to kill him.
Splotches of blue settling into purple are covering what skin that isn’t bleeding or, Ajax whistles lowly, burned. It doesn’t take a genius to figure out that whoever left the nasty burn mark on most of the man’s lower torso had been out to hurt.
Ajax can hardly perceive the slow rise and fall of the man’s chest, but he waits a few more minutes for the man to say anything.
“You’re going to die,” Ajax informs him, in case he didn’t notice. When the man doesn’t respond, he picks up his stick and pokes him right on the burn mark. “Hey.”
At the third poke, the man opens his eye.
Ajax pokes him again.
“...Ow,” is the only word that comes out of the bastard’s mouth and makes no move to talk more.
Ajax’s brow twitches.
“You’re dying,” he makes sure to put emphasis on the word, but the man only blinks languidly at him.
Oh, Tsaritsa, Ajax thinks, getting up from his crouch because clearly, there’s no use helping him.
It’s already too late, after all.
He moves to walk away, stick with a bloodied end in hand, and he’s all too intent to get the fuck out of here and back home.
Already several steps back into the trees, Ajax stops.
He re-evaluates his situation—what he has on right now, and what opportunities he can take.
He turns around and walks right back to the injured man.
Dammit, dammit, dammit.