Fitz watches Dex's fingers shake on his newest gadget as he tries to shove wires through a tiny hole and feels a little like shaking himself.

He's in an elegant, emerald green chair that's horrendously out of place in the messy tech and elixirs filling Dex's room to the brim. It's not very comfortable, but he's come to enjoy the texture of the smooth velvet.

The two of them haven't spoken in over fifteen minutes, but Fitz finds that it's okay. They've made a habit of getting together once a week since Fitz came out of the Healing Center with a broken leg and an uncertain heart. This silence is one he's used to, one he's grown familiar with.

Fitz is content to watch Dex put together the new weapons or shields or helpers that will decide battles for them. But his hands are shaking. He's never seen his hands shake like that. Only in the days when he and Sophie came back from being kidnapped, and Fitz had gone to the Healing Center and Dex had been pale and blotchy red at the same time, tears leaking from his eyes like he didn't know how to hold them back anymore. Or when Fitz had been stabbed by the arthropleura and Dex had apologized for the first time.

So Fitz breaks the silence. "Need any help?"

Dex laughs, but not rude like he once would have. He's on his stomach on the floor, various odds and ends, springs and gears and scraps flung out around him. "I don't think so."

"What are you making, anyway?" Fitz peers curiously at the contraption in his hand. It resembles a round ball, with six spindly legs attached to the bottom.

"It's supposed to be a tomple." Dex casts a frustrated glance at it. "It's not for the Black Swan or the Council. I was taking a break from making gadgets that would break through Ruy's shields, because these guys are really useful. They eat dust and keep things clean, but they also like to eat other things. So we can't have an actual animal around all the elixirs, but I was thinking that if I could make one out of tech then it would only eat dust and even if it malfunctioned and ate an elixir it wouldn't be hurt since it's not alive. But I can't seem to figure out how to make it navigate around all the glass bottles without breaking anything, since it also has to get between them and all that—"

A resounding crash echoes through the room, and Fitz jumps. Dex just sighs. "Ignore that. Bex is having a lovely time phasing through every wall, except Lex made everything really icy so either she surprises someone and they slip or she slips, and then they start with the snowballs..."

Fitz presses his hands to his thighs. "How's Rex?"

Dex gives him a quick glance and looks quickly away, shadows filling his face. "Oh. He's fine. Waiting... waiting to manifest. And all that."

"I'm sure he will," Fitz attempts. He knows the feeling of wanting to manifest so badly that it tears up your entire being. But he only lived with that feeling for a short while. "Twins or triplets usually are all one or the other. He'll manifest."

"See, that's the problem." Dex concentrates on his tomple, fingers constricting like he wants to squeeze it into submission. His eyebrows press together in frustration. "All you, Vackers and shit, you don't understand that sometimes we don't see manifesting as the most important part of a kid's life. It doesn't matter if he manifests. He'll still be awesome. It doesn't even matter."

Fitz's fists clench, and he wonders if Dex believes that himself. "I just meant—"

"I know what you meant," Dex snaps. It's been a while since they've been so uneasy together. So uncertain in where they stand. "It's easier for you. Manifesting is more important for you. We don't need abilities here. We know we're worth something without them."

Fitz looks around at the gadgets on Dex's floor, then the elixirs shoved to the back of the room. "Looks like it."

He didn't mean to say that. Like most everything he says, it slipped out. But he can't take it back, not when Dex's face is already clouding over with shadowed anger. But even though his fists clench, both of them have enough practice of being in control of their emotions that he simply says, "You don't know what it's like. You don't know anything."

Fitz sits still. The sweat coating his hands feels like it should be guilt, shame, the remnants of words spoken in arrogance, ignorance, entitlement. He's right. He's wrong. He's fucked in the head.

What can Dex know of what he's been through? What about feeling alone even when you're surrounded by everyone you know? Dex doesn't make many friends but when he does, they're loyal. Fitz can count the people he trusts on one hand, the same one that pulled the level that lowered the glass that trapped his brother into a cage and drowned him. Alvar is a Vanisher because it meant no one could see his deception. Biana is a Vanisher because she is meant to be seen. Fitz is a Telepath because he is supposed to know both of them far too well. All of them are failures. Two out of four ain't bad in terms of fuckups, right?

He's changed enough to know when to shut his mouth. When to accept that the world does not belong to him alone.

So he nods.

And they leave it at that.

...

Fitz clicks his pen over and over again until he gets a headache from the sharp sound.

We don't need abilities here. We know we're worth something without them.

He shakes Dex's voice from his head and wishes matchmaking packets were multiple choice instead of fill in the blank.

Because questions like "What's your favorite flower?" and "If you could do anything you haven't before, what would it be?" are nearly impossible to answer. He's tempted to scribble out an easy answer like roses or visit trollish cities but he knows that this is one piece of work he can't lie on. This packet holds his entire future in a few basic questions.

What's your favorite color?

Gold. It's always been gold. He's just about to write that when his door creaks open, and Fitz stiffens. But his panic evaporates as Keefe closes the door behind him, moving immediately towards him and burying his head in his shoulder.

Keefe's arms go around Fitz's waist, and he takes a deep breath in, blond hair tickling his nose.

It's natural and unnatural at the same time, familiar and new, right and wrong. Keefe's ribs feel bonier than usual, hollowed with exhaustion and hunger and maybe wanting. His shoulders shake, and Fitz slowly moves one hand to his back and the other to his neck, bringing them impossibly close.

Fitz's face is heated with something, maybe the remainder of what Sophie had misinterpreted about their relationship and maybe because of the terror coursing through his body. A lump sits in his throat, heart beating too quickly. He's nothing but bones set on fire, frosted with heat and broken in every way that counts.

"Hey," he murmurs gently, his voice rough, not quite strong enough. "What's wrong?"

Keefe lifts his head carefully, and when he looks Fitz full in the face his eyelashes are clumped together with tears. He shakes his head.

Fitz's thumb moves against Keefe's neck, and he shudders, eyes lowering, and suddenly he lands back inside his body and realizes that their lips are barely an inch away, trembling with distance. Fitz drops his hands and steps away, and Keefe curves in on himself like a plant without sun.

I know you're in love with him.

Keefe drops onto the bed and curls into a ball on top of the navy blue covers. Fitz hesitates, then sits down beside him. His hand hovers over Keefe's head for a moment, skates around his cheek, but doesn't touch him and soon comes back to rest in his lap.

"Sorry," Fitz says, and his voice breaks halfway through into jagged shard of glass.

Keefe shakes, his tears soaking into the sheets. His hair sticks to his forehead and the back of his neck with sweat, his face so red it looks sunburned.

And Fitz lands back in the moments after Keefe first woke up from his coma. The numbness followed by the silence, waking up on the floor and seeing Keefe's sweaty, pale face a mask of pain and horror. Then the days after, when he refused to speak. When he pushed everyone away. When he ran away again.

When he ran away again.

Typical.

Gripped by sudden fear, Fitz laces his fingers through Keefe's and transmits, Can we speak mind-to-mind?

Keefe shakes his head.

"Okay," Fitz says aloud, panic snatching breath from his lungs. If he holds Keefe's hand tightly enough, he won't be able to leave again. He considers this plan a good one, and grabs his other hand for good measure. Keefe's grip tightens against his, fingers clammy and shaking. "We don't have to talk. That's okay."

It's not okay. It's very clearly not okay. Fitz's heartbeat isn't slowing down. Shouldn't it be slowing down? Why is the thought of Keefe running away making his blood race through his veins like it's trying to win gold?

Keefe wipes his eyes with his shoulder. They sit there for long enough that Fitz lays down next to him, slowly loosening his grip on his hands.

After what feels like years, Keefe opens his eyes again. They're rimmed with red and the shadows under them are enough to fill the Sanctuary with darkness. They study Fitz's face with curiosity and a bit of fear, mouth opening slowly to croak: "Sorry."

Fitz lets his breath escape. They face each other on the bed, each on their sides. "For what?"

"For—" His voice is jerky, words strung together with paperclips all bent out of shape. "For getting snot all over your pillow. And all over you." He attempts to retrieve his smile, but partially fails, wavers.

He should be sorry for making Fitz feel like this. For being made of confusion, of butterflies, of thunder, of clouds. "What happened?"

So Keefe tells him about Cassius summoning him, and an argument, and beginnings and endings, and sweat and tears. Stop telling the truth. Start lying again. Please start lying again.

"I didn't know how to make it— how to— Shit, Fitz. What did I do?" Keefe buries his face in his hands, and this time Fitz lets himself place his hand on his hair, moving closer.

"I won't say it wasn't your fault. I won't even say he deserved it," he says, and Keefe looks at him in half-anger and half-guilt. "But you did what you had to do."

"How does that make it any better?" Keefe doesn't move as Fitz takes his hand away, eyes creasing with distress.

"It doesn't," Fitz tells him. "Nothing makes it better."

"So how do I live with this power?" Keefe searches his gaze, pressing his lips tight like even the reminder of its existence is enough to send the compulsion through him.

"I don't know the answer to that."

"Aren't you supposed to?"

This means: Haven't you done worse?

Fitz doesn't respond, and soon Keefe moves closer and rests his head right next to his chest, an apology.

"Ruy is dead," Keefe says. "Tam killed him."

Fitz thinks about shadows and echoes and saltwater tears. He thinks about the crutches resting at the side of the door in case he needs them and the talk a few months back of giving him a knee brace for emergencies, and the weeks in the Healing Center, listening to everyone's murmurs and worry and anger. And he thinks about shields and how they trap and protect, about electricity and the way it arcs as it cuts through the air, and blood dripping down chins, and he thinks about cages, and vanishing and reading minds and creatures that are hungry for more than the dust they were meant to eat. He thinks about his brother.

"Good."