When Rue closed his hand, the portal disappeared, but the saddened expression on Roxas's face lingered in his mind that Rue couldn't move for a while after. Rue felt guilty for upsetting Roxas and wished he thought his words through before speaking. Rue can only speak for his experience over the last four years; he had no clue what those years were like for Roxas.
When Rue finally collected his soul that had scattered, he looked around the room before he walked over to the bed. Rue laid his bag, bow, Roxas sword on the before going into his pocket to take out the glove he had shared the other with Harlow. He stared at it sadly for a long time before resting the glove on the pillow. Times like this Rue wished his mom was around to hold him and tell him that everything would be okay.
When Rue's hands were free of holding things, he walked over to the window across from the bed and when he touched the glass, the glass disappeared, and the cool evening breeze rushed in, startling him. When he stepped away, the glass returned. Rue wasn't sure why he was so surprised by this, but he was. This place was not like the inn at all.
As he look down from the ledge he guessed he was about two stories from the ground. There was a garden below his window that he was sure of its beauty and so he couldn't wait to see the different colors when touched by daylight. Beyond the garden, down a stretch of green fields in the distance was a forest.
When Rue first saw the orange and white trees of Nulta, he really did feel like he had fallen into a colorful storybook. Now when he saw strange trees, he didn't think anything unnatural about them.
Rue thought the trees before him were equally as beautiful as those in Nulta. The leaves were green, but the tree itself were white and had a blue hue to them like glaciers. There were a few places in Aangula he remembered from his studies that had these trees. It never once occurred to him that one of those places would be Roxas's backyard. They were surreal to look at; they reflected the night sky where they glowed a soft light.
With the little energy Rue had left, he touched the wall to examine the structure. As he scanned, the place grew in size that Rue was convinced it was a castle. It had different buildings that were connected by bridges, far larger than the town he stayed in with the Arlets. Rue wondered where Roxas had brought him, Rue trusted Roxas when he said he wouldn't bring him to the royal capital, so where was this place?
For a long time, Rue had dreamt of seeing the place where the clouds, mountains, and waterfalls met. From what he could see so far, this place was beautiful, but he saw so little that it was unclear if this was even it.
Roxas was truthful when he said no one was allowed in this area. Of all the connected structures, the area where Rue was, he couldn't pick up on anyone's heat signature. The other parts of the castle were filled with armed guards and servants moving about, even while Roxas was not around.
When Rue's energy ran out, and he couldn't see further, the adrenaline that kept him from feeling the pain pulsing through his body faded as if his painkillers had subsided.
When Rue felt drips roll down his back, Rue knew it wasn't sweat. Rue took a deep breath and untied the string to the coat Harlow had given him, his eyes watered as he struggled to take the layer off. When Rue finally did, Rue was down to see his blood had soaked through it. Rue wanted to blame Roxas for reopening the wound but also knew in his heart that if Roxas had known he was injured, he wouldn't have shoved him. Rue took a deep breath, ignored the waves of pain that struck him like a needles as he grabbed his bag, and walked towards the door that from his scan he saw a loo.
As Rue entered, he rested the bag down, triggering the lights. As Rue looked around, he wasn't sure what he was seeing. Other than the door across the room, all Rue saw was the same gray quarts that covered the floor, walls, and ceiling. Back home with his mother, they had a wooden tub, basin, and loo. It was identical to his set up with the Arlets.
Here however, nothing he saw made sense as he walked further in. When he looked at the light fixture along the wall, Rue tested to see if they would turn off if he waved his hand like how Roxas did. When each light fixture turned off simultaneously, Rue waved the lights back on since there weren't any windows in the space that could alert his presence.
From there, Rue's eyes gaze at the crater in the stone floor at the center of the room. Rue walked around it, thinking how dangerous it would have been if he walked in without lights. Though it wasn't too deep, he worried about hitting his head on the stone flooring.
Rue glanced up and down before walking to the only door in the room. He was confident that behind the door would be the loo he saw in his scan. When Rue pushed the door open and saw it, he was quite pleased with himself.
When a stone protruding from a wall caught his eye, the thirst that wasn't there before rushed him as if he had been searching for water for many days.
Rue hurried to it and was instantly baffled to think he might have been excited about a table. It was just a bowl, with no spout for water. He felt around it before touching the center. When he did, water poured from a thin opening in the wall on to his hand.
It was nothing like the brown water of the underworld, it was crystal clear and cold, and when he took a sip, it didn't taste grainy. When his stomach started to ache, he realized that he had drunk too much water, so he pulled his hand away, stopping it from pouring. Rue waiting until the cramp in his stomach passed before turning his focus to the bowl in the middle of the room that he believed he figured out.
Rue stood close to the edge and stuck out his arm to see if it would trigger water to fall. When nothing happened, Rue walked to another angle and tried again. When he felt like he was opening his stitches more, he stopped. When Rue had another idea, Rue sat on the edge and took off his boots, leaving them on the side before standing. Before Rue moved, he wondered if he should take off his clothes to. When he wasn't sure, his plan would even work, Rue walked to the center.
The ceiling opened, and the water just poured like rain, and there was no way to avoid it. Frustrated, Rue wished he trusted his instinct that told him to take off his clothes. Now he was soaked from head to toe, the wet clothes laid heavy on his wound, causing a burning sensation.
Rue stepped away from the pouring water that continued to fill the bath. He walked to the edge and slowly undressed. Wringing out the wet clothes before laying them flat on the floor outside of the tub. When he finally got to the bandages wrapped around his torso, Rue clenched his jaw as he unraveled it. When he wrung it out, seeing the blood pour from it made him nauseous.
No matter how much blood had spilled into the bath, it never changed the color of the water. Rue washed the bandage the best that he could before putting it by his clothes. When he finally lowered to sit, the water stop when the pool reached his shoulders. As Rue held his breath and allowed the water to clean his wound, many thoughts circulated in his mind, and one of them was whether he would make it through the night after losing so much blood.
So much has happened that it was impossible for Rue to focus on one thing. This was the second time in his life where he sat in a bath to clean away blood from an event that nearly cost him his life. The second time he regretted not staying behind when he was asked to. It was like he was cursed to make terrible decisions over and over again.
When Rue searched for the positive through this chaos, he remembered Harlow and how if none of this had happened, he would not have known his best friend was alive. When he thought about Roxas, he wasn't sure. Deep in his heart, he was happy to see him again, but he couldn't ignore the wall he felt between them that wasn't there before.
Back then, Roxas was a mystery to him, and yet Rue loved him and dreamed of the day that they would meet again. Now that that day has come, it was different, and Rue believed it was because of the things he knew about Roxas that caused the drift.
The young boy he met years ago was now an engaged man and commander of their royal army. When Rue learned of his engagement, it was the second saddest day of his life. Rue believed it was a sign that he'll never see Roxas again. Despite this Rue couldn't package away his heart after it was open.
After all, Rue spent so many years wondering what Roxas' existence meant to him after only knowing him for a few days. If Harlow had never asked the question, Rue would never confess his love for Roxas out loud. It was as if at that moment, it all came together.
At that moment, Rue understood that Roxas was his fated pair and that he should be grateful to have met him in this lifetime. Many folks aren't as lucky. They spend their whole life searching for their soulmate, and if they are like him, that someone could be from another world.
When Rue wasn't sure how he would be able to continue to love Roxas in secret, he wished his heart would just strangle him already and save them both the heartache.
When Rue couldn't take the pain from the bath any longer. He decided it was best to try and get some rest. When he managed to climb out of the bath after a few painful failed attempts, he dried himself with a cloth. And he used the little bit of energy he gained from resting to dry the bandages before struggling to reapply it.
When dressed, Rue shut the bedroom lights off before they could all turn on, and walked straight for the bed. Rue was too tired to lift the covers over him, but he had just enough energy to pull the sword close.
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