(Warning. This chapter contains discussion of self harm, but it doesn't go into detail. I've made sure that little to no plot is laid out, so if you wish to skip this chapter altogether, it won't impact the story.)

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Cole could tell that something was wrong as soon as he saw Jay walk onto the deck.
He rushed outside, standing at the top of the stairs, trying to figure out what was wrong.

He couldn't.

But he could tell that Jay was shaking. Shaking and staring at the ground, alert and afraid.

It was painstakingly clear that his trip out hadn't been as smooth as he'd said it would be.

"Jay? Jay, what happened?" He asked, covering the last few metres down the stairs and over to him.

"... what's wrong?"

Jay simply shook his head, trying to push past him to get inside, but Cole blocked his way.

"Please, don't just run away... I want to help you..."

Jay ignored him, only shaking his head more vigorously, and sidestepped, rushing indoors with tears steaming down his face.

Cole could only follow him, all the way to the bathroom, where Jay slammed the door and pushed something in front of it. He could tell, as when he tried wobbling the doorknob and pushing, it wouldn't budge.

He could probably have forced it open if he wanted to, but, instead, Cole just sat outside, listening to Jay's faint whimpers as he calmed himself down. From Cole's auditory observations, he wasn't doing very well.

It... hurt. It hurt a lot to be able to do nothing but sit outside and wait for when he left, to then and only then be able to help.

He felt pretty damn useless.

A long time passed. Minutes, it possibly stretched into an hour. Cole was flipping through news articles on his phone, most of them about Jay. They made him sick.

Half of them he couldn't even bring himself to read, as the language and tone were far too derogatory to cope with.

Seeing words that objectified and disrespected his friend so deeply... Cole couldn't stand it.

Then, at last, the bathroom door swung open, and a much calmer - but still shaking - Jay stepped out into the corridor. When he caught sight of him, confusion flashed across his face, and Cole quickly brought himself to his feet.

"I... I was waiting for you to get out. I was... worried."

"... s... sorry..." Jay managed to choke out.

"What? Why are you apologising? It's not your fault?"

"It is... it is..."

The brief calm he had achieved within the bathroom's safe walls crumbled in seconds, and Jay started to cry again, letting himself fall into Cole's embrace.

"... god... Jay... what happened...?"

He was too upset to answer, clinging tighter to him instead.

"... come on, let's head to the game room. Nobody else is there right now."

Jay nodded, and wiped his eyes on his sleeve following his friend like a duckling to the empty room, where upon entry, Cole threw a discarded blanket around his shoulders. Once he was tightly wrapped up and sat comfortably on one of the big cushions, Cole could finally get a few words out of him.

It started when he saw a number of slightly arced indents on Jay's wrist, a couple having drawn blood and turned into scabs.

Jay noticed him staring, and took a deep breath, speaking at last.

"... t... there was a woman..."

"... w... what did she do?"

He tended up even further, curling into a ball as tightly as he could.

"... she... grabbed me and... s-s-started yelling at me..."

"In the middle of the street?"

Jay nodded, holding down the tears as best he could.

"... we need to call the police. That's harassment. We can't let her get away with this!"

"N-No!"

Jay's defiant statement brought Cole to a standstill. Silent, not knowing what to say at all.

"... I... don't want any more attention on m-me than there already i-is..."

Cole wanted to protest as push for taking legal action, but, he knew it would get nowhere. Jay had made up his mind.

"... I'm so sorry Jay... I... I tried to warn you but-"

"I k-know... its all my fault... I shouldn't have gone out at all..."

Fresh tears welled up in his eyes and wet his pale cheeks once more.

"Jay no, I'm not saying that at all, it's not your fault that people are like this..."

"... you were right... I shouldn't have gone out... but I didn't listen, like an i-i-idiot!"

He lifted up his arm to wipe his eyes. A simple movement. Cole payed little to no attention to it.

Though, his expertly trained eagle eyes caught something that he wished he hadn't.

A flickering of the fabric, as it shifted daintily down his forearm, revealing bare skin. Normal. Ordinary. It happened every day.

It was simple physics, gravity.

However, what was underneath, was the abnormal feature.

Air around turned cold, and an uncomfortable sensation alike trickling water ran down his back, sending shivers along every vein.

A haunting sight.

Small red lines, intercepting across his flesh, a disturbing game of noughts and crosses.

They were all scabbed over, but so blatantly recent. Red and inflamed, painful, sticking out like a sore thumb.

Cole couldn't drag his eyes from the sight.

There was no way that some woman's nails did this. Far too high up, too uniform, too... deliberate. Too controlled.

It suddenly clicked why he had spent so long in the bathroom, yet hadn't calmed down much at all.

That's what he was doing in there.

As soon as Jay realised that Cole had seen, he jerked his arm out of sight, yanking down the sleeve and stared right back, absolutely terrified in every shape and form.

He clearly hadn't intended for it to be common knowledge.

Cole was far too broken to speak. In a matter of seconds, his head state went from worried to completely and utterly devastated.

Simply knowing that somebody he cared about would even think about such a thing, let alone actually carry it out, hit extremely deep.

"... oh... oh god... Jay..." was all he could manage to force out.

Jay started sobbing, staring deliberately at the floor, shaking from head to toe.

"I... I-I'm sorry... I'm so... so sorry..."

"Why... are you apologising?"

"I... I don't know I'm just... I'm s-sorry, ok! I'm sorry! I'm sorry I'm sorry!"

Jay hid his face in his hands. Everything was far too much for him to deal with. The media, the issues as home, the issues that followed him everywhere, they all combined and beat him to the group, not stopping even when he was completely broken.

And now this too.

Cole had found out about another of his deep secrets.

It was coming to the point, where he felt he knew more about him than even he did.

Not knowing what else to do, and at a loss for anything else, Cole reached out a hand, brushing it against the back of Jay's right.

Hesitantly, he pulled his palm away from his face, and let it rest on top of Cole's instead.

"... please... talk to me... don't just... bottle it up. I'm here for you."

"... b-b-but... it doesn't even m-matter..."

"... matters to me."

Jay took a sneaky glance at Cole's expression. There was no mistaking the seriousness he embodied in that moment.

"... I'm scared, Jay." he admitted.

"... w... what?"

"I'm scared. You've been getting worse and worse lately and... this... I've seen you pretty low but... never like this... and I'm scared that one day... you'll need somebody and I won't be there for you. So... wh... while I'm here... please... let me help..."

Jay shivered again, using his free sleeve to dry up his tears.

"... I've n-never told anybody before..."

Cole didn't speak. He stroked Jay's knuckles with his thumb, and was happy when he noticed his breathing calm drastically.

"... h-here... look..."

Jay pulled the fabric down further, revealing his complete forearm, and giving Cole much more than a quick glance at what was now marking his skin. He saw the wounds in detail.

Explicit detail.

But that wasn't what Jay was taking about.

"... there... c-can you see those?" He asked, pointing at his arm.

Cole looked closer at the spot, and indeed, he saw scars. Tiny white scars that were barely visible.

So small and faded that Cole would not have spotted them, had they not been pointed out, yet, knowing that something that held such emotional depth and pain had been here in plain sight for years was... odd to think about.

"... I... I haven't done it for years... ever since I was about 13... it stopped..." Jay explained, voice still wobbling, "... I... I promised myself... that... I wouldn't ever do it again... but... h-here I am... breaking that..."

"I... don't really know what to say Jay. I want to ask why but..."

"... it... it... it's something that... I... it... helps... it's calming... and I k-know that probably sounds... really... really stupid but... it's... true..."

Cole couldn't take his eyes away from Jay's arm. Yes, the scars were far faded, but the sheer amount of them was the terrible part. And the new ones... only a few, but they were there.

A distantly familiar choking feeling arose in his throat. The same one that always came before tears... though he shoved it away.

Jay was more important right now.

Tears could wait.

"... it just... I... it-"

"It's ok, you don't need to tell me if you don't want to..." Cole cut in, sensing Jay's growing lack of comfort.

Jay nodded solemnly, and Cole gave his hand a reassuring pat.

"I will... one day... but just... not now..."

"That's fine, I don't want you to be uncomfortab-"

"I... I can talk about the other parts... though..."

He calmed himself once more, and continued.

"Everything is just too much. Far... far too much to deal with. I could... I could d-deal with it when it was just you guys... I... I could get through that... b-but... the whole c-continent? The whole w-w-world? I... I can't d-do that! And... on the street... nobody has ever... harassed me on the street before... I... I thought I'd be able to d-deal with it but I couldn't! It was horrible! This whole thing is horrible and I can't d-deal with any of it! I just wish it wou- I... I mean... I... I want it to all go away... but... it... it isn't going to... ever... ever ever ever go away!"

The atmosphere in the room had dropped several degrees, chilling Cole to the bone.

It truly was a dire situation. He wished that he had something encouraging and endearing to say to his friend, but... he didn't know anything that would make even a dent.

Jay had every good reason to be feeling this way.

So... instead of talking, Cole moved. Inches a little closer, gave his palm a squeeze, but, before he could do anything more, Zane stepped inside.

"Oh, Jay! You have arrived home! Is... is everything alright?" He asked, his expression quickly filling with concern.

Jay rubbed his eyes, drying the last tears that lingered there.

"I-I'm fine..." he sighed, subtly pulling his sleeve back down over his arm as he spoke.

Zane nodded, smiling, but clearly not believing him. He said no more though.

"I have something very important to talk to you about. May we step into the medical room?" He asked.

Cole and Jay exchanged a glance. Jay's eyes begged him to think up some excuse to get him out of this. Cole's eyes sadly refused.

Begrudgingly, and full of fear, Jay wobbled to his feet, leaning on Cole for balance, and made his way to Zane's suggested location.

"I am sorry that we frustrated you this morning. We were simply very worried about you." Zane apologised as they went.

"D-Don't worry, it's ok... I'm not mad anymore..."

"That certainly is good to hear."

The door to the room opened with ease, and the three boys filed inside one by one.

Zane gestured for Jay to sit down on the bed there, however, he didn't. He just stood there, only a step into the room.

"... Zane... h... how serious are we talking here?" he asked.

Cole could sense the fear he felt. It resonated around the room, bouncing off every surface and filling the air.

The nindroid sighed, deliberately breaking eye contact, an action he very rarely performed.

"... your lungs, Jay."

A gust of wind blew across the bounty, causing the ship to wobble slightly, the wooden boards creaking and filling all their ears with temporary noise.

It felt that even nature didn't want to hear what came next.

But alas, it had to.

"Your lungs..." Zane repeated.

Cole looked away.

"... they may be... rather... damaged."