Kili doesn't even remember how long he stood on that boat for, shaking uncontrollably as the cold sunk deep into his skin. He stood there, waiting for his brother to resurface. What the hell was he doing? Kili had thought. Dwalin had told the both of them explicitly not to stay under any longer than two, maybe three minutes at most.
"He's probably just messing around with us, Kili, he's not that stupid." Dwalin had said in an attempt at reassurance, but the uncertain edge to his voice set alarm bells ringing in Kili's mind.
Kili started to feel guilty for making Fili do this, he could see he didn't want to, and then he was stupid enough to pull him in when they dived. When five minutes had passed, he couldn't wait any longer and he dived straight back in, Dwalin's shouts lost in the surge of water behind him.
The icy water hit Kili like a brick to the face, and it might as well have been for how much his face stung after he broke the surface. He ignored it, and began swimming down into the dark, eyes stinging at the bitter cold of the water. He can't recall how long he swam for, but he remembers his lungs were starting to burn as air ran out, and his arms grew heavy and his legs barely seemed to propel him forward with each kick.
But Kili did not stop. Something was telling him to go further down, to keep looking, so he did. He pulled himself forward relentlessly, but the water was like smoke through his fingers and he began to slow, and he almost stopped. He would have turned around and back up if he hadn't caught a glimpse of gold in the gloom. His heart had almost pounded out of his ribcage, and he remembers his chest freezing over as fear claimed him in an icy grip. Pure adrenalin had burst through his veins and he pulled himself down, down into the dark.
And when Kili saw Fili in the gloom of the lake, he seemed to be frozen in motion. Falling, with his eyes shut as though in sleep, but with a smile on his face. And Kili knew. His brother was lost to the world.
Everything after that passes by in a blur.
He vaguely recalls breaking the surface of the water with Fili a dead weight in his arms. He doesn't even have time to register where he is before there are two strong arms hauling him back into the boat with Fili, and then he hears the most sickeningly painful cry he's ever heard in his life.
He doesn't even realise it's coming from him.
At first, he can't breathe. His lungs are on fire from being underwater for so long, but then it begins to feel like an iron bar pressing down relentlessly on his chest. Each desperate gasp for air just causes his chest to ache and burn even more. Otherwise, he feels numb. The cold is stinging all over, and he can't even curl his fingers.
He feels helpless, and alone, until he hears Dwalin shouting.
Suddenly, everything comes crashing down around Kili. The iron bar is gone and he's sobbing hysterically, throat red raw. He can see Dwalin hovering over him, eyes wide and face pale, like a lost child.
Kili then realises Dwalin's not looking at him, he's looking at Fili.
Fili.
Kili knows he will not forget the feeling that follows. Not through all the years of his life to the end of his days, should he live to see them out.
At first, it's like someone's taken an ice-cold, serrated dagger through him. The tear is uneven, broken. It burns violently, just as much as it feels so bitterly cold, and he closes his eyes and all he can see is the searing pain, white hot and furious, it rips through his chest and it's all he can do to clamp his mouth shut and stop himself from screaming out again.
But then it slowly ebbs like the tide, only it doesn't come back. Not even when they reach the dock with Kili clutching onto the vestiges of consciousness long enough to see Thorin break, right in front of him. Kili sees as Thorin crashes to his knees beside him and Fili. He sees his lips move in whispers; a hopeless prayer for Fili. He cracks visibly; his infallible mask had already broken into pieces on the dock, and now he was being stripped to the ugly bones of grief.
But he doesn't even cry out, and Thorin's own silence resonates through Kili and chills him to the bone.
After that, time seems to slow to a standstill. Day and night become the same thing to Kili. The world turns to grey, the colours washed out by his own grief. It seems to him that all the fires of the world grow cold, and he doesn't feel the warmth of fond memories, only the bitterness of his own desolation.
And now, he stands in front of a black granite gravestone, freshly laid. It's simple and plain, engraved in gold.
IN LOVING MEMORY OF FILI OAKENSHIELD
22ND JULY 1991 – 23RD JULY 2012
BELOVED SON TO DIS AND VALI, BROTHER TO KILI AND NEPHEW TO THORIN
NOT ALL THOSE WHO WANDER ARE LOST
Kili's gaze slips to the grey, leather bound journal in his hands, embellished with the symbol of Durin in silver on the front. It looks old and worn, the spine is cracked and the pages are falling out from overuse. There's hundreds. Filled with Fili's messy script, as though his mind was travelling too far ahead of his hand and he simply couldn't keep up with the words. There's little sketches too, of him and Thorin, some of Dwalin and Balin too, and lots of various places in the mountains that Fili loved once upon a time. Everything that made his brother was in this journal. His anger and self doubt, his talent and his love he poured into those pages, it was him. A part of Fili.
And it was all Kili had left of his brother.
Kili sighs and looks up, the wind cool on his face. The funeral was over and done with. Now they just needed to get through the wake. Kili just wanted to go home and sleep. At least then he could pretend none of this was real. None of this had happened. Fili was just in his room, messing about with his phone or doodling or just... living. Not dead and buried and left to be forgotten in a lonely cemetery on a mountain in some insignificant country in a vast ocean.
Life is a cruel little fucker, Kili thinks to himself, and he can almost hear Fili laughing at that. Fili would.
But Kili knows, he knows Fili chose this. He would not have lied down and died like an old dog; weak and pitiful. He would not have waited for death to take him. After all these years of being held prisoner in the confines of his own mind, Kili knew that Fili had had enough. He had broken free, there was no denying that, but badly scarred and with his hard outer shell shattered to pieces. It was all there to see, but no-one thought to pick up the pieces. No-one reached out to him. Even he, Fili's own brother, left him alone. The world had turned its back on Fili, and he doesn't know why he was so surprised when Fili turned his back to the world.
Kili knew then, that Fili would never really be whole again. Not properly. His brother had been there, within reach, but beyond repair.
He should have seen this coming a long time ago, Kili thinks, finally.
"Kili?" Thorin sounds so weary, Kili can't help but notice. It scares him. Thorin was made of granite, stony faced and steely eyed – he doesn't break, Kili had thought. And Kili had been proven wrong. Swallowing back the lump in his throat, he turns his head to see Thorin walking up the hill towards him, hands in his pockets and eyes trained on the grave.
"Hey, uncle." Kili murmurs in reply, but says nothing else as Thorin stands by him, looking like the wind could bowl him over in seconds.
They remain silent for a few moments, neither wants to remember particularly what had happened, yet neither is willing to move on. Stuck in a moment they couldn't get out of. At least, that's what it seems like to Kili.
But Fili did not leave them holding on to nothing, Kili thinks as he glances back down at the journal. There was a letter in there, addressed to him and Thorin both. It's from Fili, of course. Kili hasn't opened it. He hasn't even touched it, until now, when he brings it out to show Thorin. Thorin regards him curiously, but takes the letter nonetheless, and they both begin to read.
22nd July 2012
to Kee and Thorin,
i'm getting better
finally
twenty first birthday today and i can just… forget about everything that's happened because i'm getting better and that's all that matters: being a better brother, a better nephew, a better friend
right now it's 11:48pm so there's exactly twelve minutes left of my birthday, bofur's passed out, nori can't get up the stairs, i'm pretty sure thorin sucked at FIFA so he buggered off, and i literally haven't got a clue where everyone else is
but that's okay, i'm getting tired now anyway
i need to let you know though, that i couldn't have done any of this without you. at all. i wouldn't have gone to the doctors in the first place if not for you, kili, and thorin – you gave me the kick up the arse i needed to sort myself out
but now we're getting somewhere
if mum and dad were here, they'd be kicking me up the arse for doing sod all too, and i think that's mostly why i did it
i want them to be proud of me
and kili too, of course, but you've already done them (and me) proud Kee – you're in college and you're doing a bloody good job at it, better than i ever did
but i want them to be happy too, wherever they are, i want them to know that… that we're okay, us three
we're good
that's what dad always used to say, didn't he? "we're good, yeah?" and mahal, it really stuck with you, kee, i don't know why, you always said it. always! still makes me laugh though, little brother.
i don't even know why i'm writing this letter, i could have just told you this, man
i'm gonna finish it anyway, because today, life is good, and i wanna remember this
i don't want you to look back on these years with regret, or anger, or sadness, because even though things have been, well, shit - for lack of a better term - you were loved by me, even if i didn't show it half as much as i should have, and in the end, you made my life a happy one, and one worth living
and there's no tragedy in that
i love you both
Fi
A.N: it's over finally over oh god this story was haunting me for the longest time, and i will probably come back to it and rework it some time in the future but for now i'm leaving it hear before anyone asks, 'not all those who wander are lost' was actually one of the first lines that kickstarted Pyro, so i just had to add it in somewhere! ((i know, i know, it's overused and becoming something of a cliche but ah, it works for Fili so i'm damn well gonna use it) i initially just wanted it to be a one-shot that delved into the deeper workings of this particular Fili, but uh, i skipped that and went for the full out dramatics, it seems... once again, thank you so so much to all who reviewed, faved/followed or simply read Pyro - you made every chapter worthwhile! i think i'll be venturing back into middle-earth for my next fic which i'm currently trying to figure out a plot for. it'll be durin-centric (i can't help it i'm sorry) and probably - hopefully - a bit happier than Pyro i mean i like angst but even for me this was a bit of an overload D: D: