Hey! No more!

The kindness in Hika brought tears to his eyes. He remembered his father's rage when he had killed the baby bird, and promised to never hurt another creature. He remembered his mother's whipish fear and trembling anger when she had found him on the cliff. Hika just held him. Held him, and promised him the world. He buried his head in Hikas neck, and cried softly. Trembling with the tears, crying for a girl he did not love and crying for himself. The broken, silly thing he was.

He stayed there, wrapped around Hika for a time, then loosened his grip on his life line. He still didn't look at Hika, eyes to the ground when he finally spoke. "There's something in me that's different to the rest of the Armada." If he looked at Hika, he wouldn't be able to say any of this. "The rest of my litter grew up, but mostly I just feel like I'm still a child. The same child that cried when he hurt a baby bird. My brother saw it in me before I did, this broken thing. He threw me off a cliff and broke my leg. Sometimes, I wonder if he had the right of it." He needed Hika to know what he was getting into it. That his happy go lucky face he showed the world wasn't even half of it. "If you come with me, I cant promise you happiness. Maybe ill hurt you, too, and I won't even realize it." He peered up softly at his friend, his expression fathomless. A part of him wanted Hika to walk away. If he did, Mortis knew the cliff would be available to him again. It was thr quickest part to wellness. To removing the feeling of pain and wrongness. Everything else would be gone too, of course. But then he would be beyond caring.