There's No Love In the Deathzone (BL)
Chapter 188 - 182. The Thing That’s Due

Chapter 188: Chapter 182. The Thing That’s Due

If only bad thoughts were just like human waste, and they could be easily discharged from oneself by throwing them up.

If only it was that easy.

His gut, his lungs, his throat; everything felt like they were burning. He poured the content of his stomach until everything that came out was nothing more than colorless liquid, and still, everything burned.

He hacked, he wheezed, he coughed again and again, wishing that everything inside his mind could just be thrown up and flushed away. But they were still there, and now his eyes burned too.

The chamber was cold, and the dry floor was damp. And still, it couldn’t get rid of the burn eating away at his soul. Even when his skin got colder and colder.

Colder, until a pair of warm arms pulled him away from the floor, circling him, stuffing him inside an embrace so warm and soothing at the same time that Zein felt he didn’t deserve it. Those arms wrapped around him like a protective blanket, pressing him against a chest as sturdy as a barrier. And when Zein felt his cheek touch a wide shoulder, he shook.

His rapid heartbeat was slowing down, his shallow breath grew deeper. He heard the sound of his name, so soft and gentle and full of affection, calling out to him, pulling him from the mire of rotten filth. A caress on his hair, a face buried in his hair, a pair of lips pressing hard on his temple, and he broke.

"...’m sorry," Zein whimpered, weakly, clutching the arms holding him safe. His eyes were burning. "I’m sorry..."

"It’s alright," Bassena whispered against the trembling head, tightening his hold around the shaking body. "It’s alright."

He grasped the guide’s neck and caressed the messy black hair, pulling Zein even closer to him; to his chest, to his arms, to the warmth he was willing to share for the rest of his life.

"It’s just...it’s just a bad thought," Bassena said, still in a very soft voice that came from deep inside his heart.

He recalled how soft and soothing Zein’s hand was when he drowned in the grief of remembering his mother. He recalled the calming embrace, the gentle voice, the tender gaze. It was everything Bassena wanted to give Zein right now.

"We all have days like that, it’s alright."

Pressing his cheek into the sturdy arm, Zein shook his head weakly. "It’s not...it’s..."

"I said it’s alright--" Bassena almost raised his voice, and unfortunately managed to stop himself before it happened. Taking a deep breath, he rubbed the guide’s arm and said in subdued frustration. "For fuck’s sake, Zein, just listen to me."

The guide truly stopped then. He was squirming before, but now he sunk himself behind the esper’s arms. He stopped shaking and shifting his head, just laying on the strong shoulder, leaning against the sturdy chest. And listened.

"It’s alright," Bassena sighed, wondering if he said that a bit too harshly, but he continued anyway. "It’s fine if you feel guilty all the time, it’s your feelings, it’s your mind, it’s your right."

It would be a lie if he said he never saw those intrusive thoughts plaguing the guide’s mind over and over and over again. He had tried, in his own way, in the best way that he could, to remind the guide that not every bad thing that happened in his life was his fault.

But he also knew, from his own experience, that guilt wasn’t something that could be erased just because other people said it wasn’t your fault. Because ultimately, the only person who could say that was the victim, the person they felt guilty for. And if that person was no longer around to give them forgiveness, then the only one who could forgive them was...themselves.

Bassena had been in that position for so long. He was constantly feeling guilty about his mother’s death. It took him a long time, and help from some amazing people, to realize that the one he should blame was someone else.

Zein, however, had no such help. He was someone who stood alone, who was too used to being the one who helped others instead of being helped. People relied on him, but he couldn’t bring himself to rely on them. And in his case, especially with the twins, there was no direct perpetrator. It was an outbreak, and like natural disasters, it couldn’t just be blamed on someone, especially because whoever was causing the outbreak was probably already dead too.

So his guilt kept on festering, growing, buried in the bottom of his heart and made roots there.

No, Bassena wouldn’t tell him to stop feeling guilty, feeling regret. What he could do, instead, was try to make Zein willing to forgive himself, to throw away that guilt, to see that it really wasn’t his fault.

"You have that right, but it’s also my right to constantly remind you that it’s alright, that it’s not your fault," Bassena told the guide, pressing his lips on the pale temple afterward.

"It’s...fine," burying his face in the guide’s hair, he continued. "Even...even if that damn deity took over your body, I’ll be sure to fight him tooth and nail and drag you back, okay?"

He felt Zein flinched, and waited. When Zein gripped his arm harder, Bassena added. "I’ll even threaten the old man Snake to tell me how, alright?" he grasped the hand that was clutching into his arm, slipping his fingers between trembling, pale knuckles, and whispered. "So you don’t have to worry."

Slowly, he felt Zein grasp his hand, and they intertwined their fingers, tightly grasping into each other.

Above all else, there was something that Bassena truly wanted Zein to know, to realize.

"Zein, you’re not alone anymore," Bassena said. "I just want you to know that, okay?"

"You’re not...you’ll never be alone anymore. There are people who will fight along with you, who will come to your help."

"No one asks you to save the world alone,"

Because they weren’t some kind of heroes like what people liked to believe, and the world was never the responsibility of a single person.

In the first place, the reclamation project had already been in motion before they even meet or knew about Zein’s identity as the fragment of Setnath. And Bassena spent four years searching for him for no reason other than the fact that he fell in love with an unnamed guide he met in the middle of nowhere.

Bassena couldn’t care less whether Setnath would have the power to purify the corrupted land or not. No one ever mentioned that Setnath wanted to be reborn to save the world--if anything, based on Zein’s insight, the deity just wanted to be human again.

Even if Setnath would be some kind of messiah, would Bassena trade Zein for the world?

Not a chance.

He would rather save the world himself, even if he had to bathe in blood, sweat, and tears.

"So don’t disappear," he whispered, requested, begged. "There will be a lot of people missing you if you do,"

Bassena was sure of it, and he was sure that Zein knew about it to some extent. Wasn’t that why he wanted to end himself as himself? While he could still remember those people, while those people still remember him as Zein and not Setnath.

"And...I’ll be the one who will miss you the most," his whisper, this time, was even more personal. There was trembling in that husky voice; a tremble that spread into Zein’s heart and soul.

"So..." Bassena bit his lips, feeling the figure in his embrace starts to shake again. But this time, he didn’t try to stop the man, didn’t tell Zein to calm down. "Don’t disappear, Zein."

It was wordless, silent; the only sign was the shaking of the shoulder and his damp sleeve. His heart was hurting, their heart was hurting, but it was okay this time.

Because this time, they weren’t alone.

Tightening his hold on the guide, Bassena buried his face in the messy hair, pressing his lips on the trembling temple. He could almost taste the tears, the anguish and the misery of holding everything by himself, too scared and too unfamiliar with reaching out his arm for help.

Zein had always been a sturdy figure, strong, firm, a mountain to shield others, and an umbrella to nurture and protect. But right now, he looked so weak and vulnerable, and that was okay. Clutching tightly to his arms, shivering on the cold floor; he wanted Zein to feel safe enough to be vulnerable.

As an esper, Bassena had never thought of his duty of raiding dungeons and saving people as something other than a job. Of course, it was meaningful, but it was a career choice, something that he did because he was trained to do that all his life.

But tonight, as he held the shivering figure of the only person he ever loved, Bassena realized it wasn’t just a job. In his heart, in his soul, in his core, there was a desire to protect, using his power to save someone.

And a speck of light finally arrived inside his darkness. And the sound of a crashing wave.

"I’ll protect you," Bassena vowed. "I promise."

It was a dark room, it was cold, it was as painful as that night. But tonight, Zein wasn’t alone. The arms holding tight to him was warm, so warm it almost scalding. As warm as the tears streaming from his eyes; tears that had been due for many years.