In the end you might have killed him. Put him down like the trouble dog he always was, but you're still a puppet and there's no way you can free yourself from that
Whoever had been pulling the strings dropped them, and now he dragged them behind with every step.
There are no phaser pistols designed to shatter words. No one invented a pill to obliterate that sort of trauma set under his skin, crawling in blood in tissue and poisoning his lungs nearly as bad as any other drug. No therapy to even thread the needle required. He just had to wait until he forgot. And God, he was good at forgetting.
He wakes up one night next to warmth and the sound of rain and he remembers, not in fear but in that stomach-curling humiliation, the unfortunate truth in that stupid fucked-up place that may as well not exist anymore. And it takes all of the other man's power to soothe him, remind him he is here and human and in no danger, and when that's not enough he hums to him, and at that moment a truth even worse crashes down.
Never let someone else be your constant, he remembered someone telling him. But he didn't know how else to let himself be with someone. He'd never been taught. And so he blurted out: "I love you."
