A/N: A de-rusting exercise that turned into a series of sorts. The twins are my muse, I guess. Originally posted on tumblr.

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He was tired.

Sleep never seemed to come easily to him, and even when it did it was fleeting and scarce and brought bad thoughts into an already muddled psyche. His nights consisted of an endless cycle of tossing and turning beneath the sheets, willing his mind to just please stop functioning for a few hours so he could justbe for a moment without all the guilt and worry and pent-up frustration.

But even that thought made him feel guilty. Who was he to ask for such a thing when he knew there was another in the same position, probably even worse so than his, who put up with the stigma every single day without fail? So he would forget that part, and find himself content with his insomnia for another day or two. He didn't have it so bad.

When he got up in the morning—waiting until the sun had risen from its place below the horizon had become nothing more than a formality in the household now—he always found him right beside the kitchen table, hovering next to a chair, the same one every time. Without fail he would be there. It wasn't until Lucas made his presence known to the red-haired boy that he turned around, locked eyes with the blonde, and slowly, mechanically, made a move to sit down.

It was up to Lucas to make breakfast every morning, so he did just that. Gathering utensils, breaking eggs, pan-frying bacon, all in the empty silence of the red-haired boy's presence. It usually wasn't until the meal was well underway that any sort of conversation was had…and that was a term used loosely.

"'Morning."

The red-haired boy had grown used to this phrase and how to properly respond. "Good morning."

"Did you have a good night?" Asking others about sleep directly made him woozy.

"It was fine." That was all he ever responded with. "And yours was fine too, I assume." They were both guilty of it.

He had grown hardened to the harsh sound of such a familiar voice speaking in such an inhuman manner. "Yes, mine was fine." He never liked to linger on the fact that nine out of ten times their communications resulted in thinly-veiled lies. "Thank you."

It was hard to believe that it had only been a dozen or so days since the world had reset. Porky was gone—for now, at least—the Pigmasks had disbanded and most of the chimeras, if not disappeared, had found a place somewhere to live more or less peacefully. Lucas found that most everyone in Tazmily had either forgotten about all that had happened in the past three years or refused to acknowledge the fact that it had ever happened. That was fine and all, until Lucas realized that he had no one to talk to about it, and all the misgivings and regret went unsaid, never leaving his immediate consciousness.

The front door of the house squealed as it was thrown open to make way for Lucas' father, sweaty from his morning sheep rounds and no doubt hungry as well. He was speechless for the most part as well, completing the trifecta of silent males perfectly. He made a point to greet him, at least. "G'morning, Lucas." The hesitation at the end was almost intentional.

"'Morning, dad," the blonde greets right back. "Scrambled, or omelets?"

"Scrambled."

So he continued to cook. He heard the gritty screech of the chair on the wooden floor as Flint sat himself down at the table—almost certainly the one furthest away from the redhead, at the edge of the table. Flint had a harder time than Lucas coming to terms with his presence and what it meant, and with how little they had dared communicate with one another—not at all—it was hard to see them in the same vicinity.

When the eggs were sufficiently scrambled and the bacon cooked through, Lucas went about serving the food. Flint's portion was the biggest, followed by Lucas' own plate. The red-haired boy's was the smallest, by request. He assured that he required little sustenance on a daily basis and insisted that they didn'twaste food on him.

They ate in silence, save for the quiet scrapes of forks on plates and soft chewing movements. Flint all but shoveled food into his mouth, discomfort evident in the way his movements were strained and fast. The red-haired boy was, on the opposite end of the spectrum, very slow and deliberate in his approach, savoring every bite like it was his last. He made eye contact with no one, simply staring at a space on the table like it had mesmerized him.

Lucas watched on with a detached sense of sadness. The first night had been borderline unbearable; despite all they had been through, together no less, there was such a physical and emotional disconnect that it made Lucas want to cry. It had gotten better, for lack of a more accurate word. There was no longer a debilitating, festering awkward silence to contend with, but rather the emptiness of a company lost to the unpredictability of past catastrophe.

As much as it pained him to think it, the blonde knew that the red-haired boy's presence that was primarily responsible for it—all of it. Lucas' restless mind, Flint's emotional distance, the town's hesitation to associate with them. It was just so unfair. The only thing the red-haired boy had done was survive; that was his only action, and only fault. He knew everything. He knew Lucas, he knew Flint, he knew the town, he knew Hinawa, he knew Claus. He could not, however, identify with any of it. He was no longer the boy they had searched for all those years, and in the same way no longer the puppet that had made his life a literal hell. He was his own being—in the making.

He was so tired. All Lucas wanted to do was curl up into himself and think about nothing and worry about nothing and remember nothing. But he knew that he could not abandon this boy, whom had done nothing to deserve his fate, just because he wasn't feeling up to snuff.

He would help him, and perhaps in the process he would help himself, too.

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