Without the context, of how far they've come, how far Vanitas has come, he might throw that question right back in his face. A nasty how dare you for showing this sort of piteous compassion. As if Vanitas needs to be handled with kid gloves, when all his remembered life it's been nothing but himself to rely on. If it hadn't been Riku himself, sitting at the makeshift dining table while Vanitas stared hard at the stove where the boiling pot of water sat. If it hadn't been them to offer him a wet cloth in place of the sound of running water.
Riku comes close, blocks his view of the bathrub with his broader frame. He can still see it in his mind's eye, but he focuses on what's in front of him. His eyes skim up over Riku's dirty shirt to his face.
"No." The defiance isn't gone from his voice, though, the firm denial making it clear he won't broker any gentle encouragement on the matter. He's mercurial at best, but this sort of careful consideration seems to flip some switch inside him quicker than anything else. It's taken them time, to get to this point, where it isn't flicked inadvertently. "It's fine."
Still, there's an uncertain flicker of his eyes, like he's trying to look around Riku without actually moving. His attention flits back up.
It's not an empty promise. There's something pragmatic about it - of course he is, because they both need to get clean - but he knows enough about the fear that once froze him in his tracks that he is entirely unwilling to abandon him to it. He would not abandon a friend, so he wouldn't leave Vanitas alone to this.
Doesn't it seem so simple? Just washing off the worst of the last however-many-days?
But it isn't. To Riku, it's exorcising the evils of how long their captivity and torture felt, regardless of how many hours it occupied. Their suffering is not equally applied or reacted to, irregardless of who was held against their will, who was tormented by the green eyed spirits.
He's here for Vanitas, like he would be here for the people dear to his heart.
"Come on. Let's rinse the worst off before we get in, okay?"
There's a stool, a shallow bucket he's already filled with warm water, there's a bar of soap and a washcloth soaking in that bucket. They can at least scrub and sluice off the worst before they use the tub.
It's barely perceptible, the tiniest unscrewing of tension in his shoulders. He finally relinquishes the clothing, handing it over to Riku to set on the counter, and there's something unconscious about the gesture. Surrendering a lifeline to exchange it for another. He doesn't reach for Riku once his hands are empty, but he doesn't feel unmoored by it— like maybe Riku's word, his presence, is enough for now.
Instead, his attention goes to the stool, the little bucket of water. It's more like a pot on a stove. It's shallow, discrete. The sort of thing that wouldn't have even drawn his attention before. Not for the first time, frustration and self-loathing curdle in his gut. No matter how many times Bruce has told him it isn't his fault, he can't help perceiving this as some sort of weakness. What kind of fool is afraid of water?
But maybe it's the fatigue that keeps the worst of it at bay. It swells up in him and then recedes like the surf.
Without a shred of self consciousness, he takes his bloodied, torn shirt and pulls it off over his head, unceremoniously dropping it in a heap on the floor. He isn't battered. The spirits had never hurt them like that— but the unhealed cuts are still there, things that the dregs of his magic hadn't been able to heal. It stopped working after a while. Vanitas isn't sure if it's because he'd been drained to nothing, or if it's like what happened to him before: these injuries inflicted by the spirits just didn't fix the same way.
He doesn't look down at himself, but instead turns his eyes contemplatively on Riku— then steps forward to take the hem of his shirt to start pulling it up and off.
Vanitas pulls off the torn and blood-stained shirt that's been sticking to him this whole time and Riku pushes the grappling hook further up on the counter lest a careless movement send it crashing to the floor - and potentially someone's bare foot. Some of this is an idle attempt to avert his eyes from those awful cuts, the way dried blood cakes into the not wholly healed incisions, knowing that it's not all Vanitas's, the same way it is for the imprecise surgical scars Riku wears under his own blood-blackened shirt.
It's stiff in places where the stain's darkest, a rough scrape when it's pulled up; Riku's shoulders go stiff but he doesn't protest, he lifts his arms and ducks his head as he pulls it through the collar. His nose wrinkles at the stink. Bile, blood, stale sweat gone sour with adrenaline.
The feeling that they're still in danger has yet to recede, even if they're here, inside these walls - Riku wasn't taken from the Museum, he was in transit to the Invincible, with a cake meant for March birthdays like Daylight's... and those who didn't have one. That vulnerability continues to beat inside his chest, hard and quick.
Riku has been known to tease his friends, mock his enemies, he pushes and he challenges. Sometimes it's just because he can. Right now he does it to grasp for something normal.
"I can do this myself," chides Riku, even though he relents, suspecting that this is just one way of having control over a situation where he has little else. "Or is this gonna be a thing now?" he says, shaking out his hair once he's free, glancing down again to assess the damage.
Neither of them healed quite right, the lines stand out, inexpertly carved out of them each. His belt buckle clatters on the counter.
It's lost on him, until Riku says it, that this isn't the first time Vanitas has stripped him. The last time had been in a similar state of duress, though worse, because Riku had been so close to gone that had Vanitas been thinking practically maybe he might not have bothered to try and bring his guttering lantern back to life. Watching the light wink out of his eyes would have been easy for him months ago, before he ever got to this place. He might have even relished the opportunity to be the one to do it.
Now, the thought makes his skin crawl.
His eyes flick to Riku's face. He isn't quite looking at Vanitas, his eyes somewhere else, not just by their placement but by the shadows lingering in them. Those green-eyed spirits haunting them even here. Vanitas can't really blame him— Riku might have been out in the town, but Vanitas had been here. Even pushed to his limit, he can't quite turn off the vigilance wiring his muscles tight.
He turns away from Riku as the other boy continues undressing, tossing over his shoulder: "Take better care of yourself and I won't have to."
It sounds casual, and under the current circumstances would be unfair, but there's a weight to the statement. Vanitas, after all, can cut to the quick of Darkness much easier than anyone. He's seen the way Riku acts. He's seen the patterns. He finishes undressing with his back to Riku as he walks toward the stool, with clinical efficiency and without a shred of modesty. He kicks aside the rest of his clothing in a heap without watching where they land.
"...Wow," Riku's tone might be taken as dry instead of sincerely surprised, albeit in a muted way. Too exhausted to bristle, Riku turns his head away, extracts first one leg from his jeans and then the other, eventually heaping his soiled clothing on the floor.
"That's almost sappy coming from you."
And this isn't lost on Riku, either - he knows that his drive to protect those who are important to him is a double-edged sword, that his own grief and hurts have in turn harmed and worried the very people he wants to protect - he's aware of how little choice they had in what they experienced, that their only earlier escape might have been in death.
Finding the other washcloth still sitting in the sink where he'd soaked it in water, he takes the second bar of soap, beginning to lather up the washcloth.
"..." Riku doesn't know how to be anyone else than who he is, he's tried, all that did was push away his friends. "I know I haven't made it easy. For you or Bruce. That the stakes are gonna continue to get higher here." They escaped, with Bruce's help, and they might not be so lucky the next time the spirits attack them, or some new disaster strikes.
Vanitas sits down on the stool, maybe a little harder than intended. His whole body aches, there are cuts on his body that have begun seeping from all the movement again. He knows they're going to sting, when he tries to wash them, but he knows better now the necessity of doing it. Things like why Quentin had covered his hands in vodka before putting them into his leg to set the bone.
He leans over his knees to pick up the cloth from the bucket, ringing it out and starting at his ankles and his shins.
"Save it," He says, without looking up. His legs aren't that bad. They seemed to like to cut into the meatier parts of him— his torso, the muscle of his thighs, the muscle of his arms. Blood and grime come off of him, leaving strips of pale skin behind. "I know what you're like, Master Riku." There's a hint of derision in his voice, though maybe that's as much habit as anything else. Riku would throw himself on a fire to stop others from burning. Vanitas knows this well, even without Riku saying it so plainly.
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no subject
Riku comes close, blocks his view of the bathrub with his broader frame. He can still see it in his mind's eye, but he focuses on what's in front of him. His eyes skim up over Riku's dirty shirt to his face.
"No." The defiance isn't gone from his voice, though, the firm denial making it clear he won't broker any gentle encouragement on the matter. He's mercurial at best, but this sort of careful consideration seems to flip some switch inside him quicker than anything else. It's taken them time, to get to this point, where it isn't flicked inadvertently. "It's fine."
Still, there's an uncertain flicker of his eyes, like he's trying to look around Riku without actually moving. His attention flits back up.
"Are you staying?"
no subject
It's not an empty promise. There's something pragmatic about it - of course he is, because they both need to get clean - but he knows enough about the fear that once froze him in his tracks that he is entirely unwilling to abandon him to it. He would not abandon a friend, so he wouldn't leave Vanitas alone to this.
Doesn't it seem so simple? Just washing off the worst of the last however-many-days?
But it isn't. To Riku, it's exorcising the evils of how long their captivity and torture felt, regardless of how many hours it occupied. Their suffering is not equally applied or reacted to, irregardless of who was held against their will, who was tormented by the green eyed spirits.
He's here for Vanitas, like he would be here for the people dear to his heart.
"Come on. Let's rinse the worst off before we get in, okay?"
There's a stool, a shallow bucket he's already filled with warm water, there's a bar of soap and a washcloth soaking in that bucket. They can at least scrub and sluice off the worst before they use the tub.
no subject
Instead, his attention goes to the stool, the little bucket of water. It's more like a pot on a stove. It's shallow, discrete. The sort of thing that wouldn't have even drawn his attention before. Not for the first time, frustration and self-loathing curdle in his gut. No matter how many times Bruce has told him it isn't his fault, he can't help perceiving this as some sort of weakness. What kind of fool is afraid of water?
But maybe it's the fatigue that keeps the worst of it at bay. It swells up in him and then recedes like the surf.
Without a shred of self consciousness, he takes his bloodied, torn shirt and pulls it off over his head, unceremoniously dropping it in a heap on the floor. He isn't battered. The spirits had never hurt them like that— but the unhealed cuts are still there, things that the dregs of his magic hadn't been able to heal. It stopped working after a while. Vanitas isn't sure if it's because he'd been drained to nothing, or if it's like what happened to him before: these injuries inflicted by the spirits just didn't fix the same way.
He doesn't look down at himself, but instead turns his eyes contemplatively on Riku— then steps forward to take the hem of his shirt to start pulling it up and off.
no subject
It's stiff in places where the stain's darkest, a rough scrape when it's pulled up; Riku's shoulders go stiff but he doesn't protest, he lifts his arms and ducks his head as he pulls it through the collar. His nose wrinkles at the stink. Bile, blood, stale sweat gone sour with adrenaline.
The feeling that they're still in danger has yet to recede, even if they're here, inside these walls - Riku wasn't taken from the Museum, he was in transit to the Invincible, with a cake meant for March birthdays like Daylight's... and those who didn't have one. That vulnerability continues to beat inside his chest, hard and quick.
Riku has been known to tease his friends, mock his enemies, he pushes and he challenges. Sometimes it's just because he can. Right now he does it to grasp for something normal.
"I can do this myself," chides Riku, even though he relents, suspecting that this is just one way of having control over a situation where he has little else. "Or is this gonna be a thing now?" he says, shaking out his hair once he's free, glancing down again to assess the damage.
Neither of them healed quite right, the lines stand out, inexpertly carved out of them each. His belt buckle clatters on the counter.
no subject
Now, the thought makes his skin crawl.
His eyes flick to Riku's face. He isn't quite looking at Vanitas, his eyes somewhere else, not just by their placement but by the shadows lingering in them. Those green-eyed spirits haunting them even here. Vanitas can't really blame him— Riku might have been out in the town, but Vanitas had been here. Even pushed to his limit, he can't quite turn off the vigilance wiring his muscles tight.
He turns away from Riku as the other boy continues undressing, tossing over his shoulder: "Take better care of yourself and I won't have to."
It sounds casual, and under the current circumstances would be unfair, but there's a weight to the statement. Vanitas, after all, can cut to the quick of Darkness much easier than anyone. He's seen the way Riku acts. He's seen the patterns. He finishes undressing with his back to Riku as he walks toward the stool, with clinical efficiency and without a shred of modesty. He kicks aside the rest of his clothing in a heap without watching where they land.
cw: suicidal ideation
"That's almost sappy coming from you."
And this isn't lost on Riku, either - he knows that his drive to protect those who are important to him is a double-edged sword, that his own grief and hurts have in turn harmed and worried the very people he wants to protect - he's aware of how little choice they had in what they experienced, that their only earlier escape might have been in death.
Finding the other washcloth still sitting in the sink where he'd soaked it in water, he takes the second bar of soap, beginning to lather up the washcloth.
"..." Riku doesn't know how to be anyone else than who he is, he's tried, all that did was push away his friends. "I know I haven't made it easy. For you or Bruce. That the stakes are gonna continue to get higher here." They escaped, with Bruce's help, and they might not be so lucky the next time the spirits attack them, or some new disaster strikes.
no subject
He leans over his knees to pick up the cloth from the bucket, ringing it out and starting at his ankles and his shins.
"Save it," He says, without looking up. His legs aren't that bad. They seemed to like to cut into the meatier parts of him— his torso, the muscle of his thighs, the muscle of his arms. Blood and grime come off of him, leaving strips of pale skin behind. "I know what you're like, Master Riku." There's a hint of derision in his voice, though maybe that's as much habit as anything else. Riku would throw himself on a fire to stop others from burning. Vanitas knows this well, even without Riku saying it so plainly.