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Saparata’s footsteps echoed through the hall against the cold stone floor. He easily dismissed the two guards by the cell, who remained nearby but out of earshot.
Saps observed the iron bars. Behind them, Thomas was sitting in a lone corner on an empty, mattressless bed. He was leaning against the vacant wall, one knee up beside himself. There was a hollow look in his eyes, staring at some distance, something beyond what Saparata could see.
He didn’t seem sad or angry, and he didn’t say anything as Saps stepped toward the cell, nor did he even acknowledge his presence.
Subconsciously, Saps began to sweat, his heart quickening its pace. Saps grit his teeth. He shouldn’t be the one in fear, in discomfort. Thomas was the one behind bars, rightfully so. He was a traitor to the lands.
Saps sighed before he spoke.
“Hey Thomas.”
Only then did Thomas take notice of Saparata, looking up lazily in his direction. His expression didn’t shift, merely his attention.
“Hey Saps.”
Saps bit his cheek. God, this was painfully awkward and painfully difficult. He didn’t know how to start, what to say, he didn’t even know what drew him in the first place. He just needed to talk to Thomas on his own terms, before he took the stand, where they both knew of and could speak of the truth.
The silence hung heavy in the cell. Thomas didn’t offer him anything, no questioning his presence, no insult to his being. He simply waited as if he had all the time in the world. Saps hated it, how calm he looked as though none of this mattered.
Saps fists clenched at his sides.
“You help cause all this bloodshed, and you can’t even look me in the eye?”
Thomas tilted his head to the side, looking at Saparata flatly.
“I’m looking.”
Saps huffed, almost rolling his eyes. He stepped forward and gripped the cold iron bars with his hands.
“You know you will die tomorrow, right?”
Thomas began to tap against his knee, absent-mindly and unphased.
“Sure,” he replied.
Saps’ hold on the bar tightened. He leaned in closer, watching Thomas closely.
“And you’re completely fine with that?” He asked, bewildered.
“I never said that.”
“So you’re not?”
“Maybe.”
Saps almost slammed his head into the bars. He only rested his head against them instead, biting the inside of his cheek.
“You’re impossible to talk to,” Saps sighed.
Thomas shrugged noncommittedly. “I don’t have anything left to say to you in here.”
Saps pushed off the bars in frustration, turning away from Thomas.
He paced around the front of the cell in an attempt to cool off, the sound of his stomps filling the corridor. He didn’t want to see the blank expression on Thomas’s face again, like everything meant nothing. Not now, not then.
“You don’t have to be here,” Thomas spoke up. Saps paused, his attention returning to Thomas. “You’ll get your chance tomorrow to tear me apart anyway.”
Saps gaped, his face contorting in irritation.
“Is that what you think I’m here for?”
Thomas raised an eyebrow in accusation, gesturing around to the enclosure he was in.
Saps sighed, raising his hand to squeeze the bridge of his nose.
It wasn’t exactly fair of Saps to ask that. It’s true, he had come into the cell more angry than not. But a part of him had ached instead of feeling relief when he had heard of Thomas’s capture.
Saps should hate him with every bone in his being. Thomas, and the entire Conspiracy, had cost Saps and so many others so much loss and suffering. They had killed with no remorse, conspired and tore people and lands apart.
So Saps still having an ounce in his blood that still found its way to somehow care, that was what was truly unfair.
“Come on, Thomas,” Saps said, exasperated. He crossed his arms, looking at Thomas solemnly. “We were friends once, weren’t we?”
A flicker of emotion flashed across Thomas’s face, too quick for Saps to register what it was. Thomas turned away, curling further in on himself, bringing his knees up to his chest.
Saps stepped forward, trying to get a better look, to see if any part of his once friend remained.
However, Thomas’s voice remained level as he spoke.
“Yes, we were.”
Saps’s brows furrowed, his teeth grinding together.
“Aren’t you even a little sorry for what you did to me?” Saps’ voice grew in anger. “Was I really that easily disposable?”
Thomas’s hand twitched against his knee, the smallest tell.
But then, Thomas stood up, facing Saparata. His expression was cold and calculated, unbothered.
“We did what we had to for Luminara. For all of Island 2.”
Saps couldn’t help but let out a pathetic and pained laugh.
“And look where that landed you,” Saps’ weak smile faltered. “In this dingy old cell, to be dead by morning.”
“And look where it landed the islands,” Thomas argued, taking a step forward. “United against one common enemy.”
Saps tsked. “You think this is victory?”
“It wasn’t about winning.”
The silence dragged on after that, both simply standing in front of one another, a literal cage between them. They were both too stubborn to say the name, if it’s one thing they all had in common.
The wound was too fresh and too open. Too inexplicitly silent for so long.
“Was it worth it?” Saps asked, his voice quieter now and raspy. “All the blood, the lies, throwing me aside?”
Thomas didn’t answer for a moment, his gaze flickering away once more.
“...yes.”
Saps’ insides squeezed in on himself, his guts churning at the word. Varying emotions flooded through him, fury and sorrow clashing into each other all at once.
“And for what?” he snapped. “For betrayal? For blood in the streets? For a cause that died the moment he—”
His voice cracked, and he bit his tongue before any name could escape. The air between them felt cold and frigid and stale.
Thomas’s eyes softened for just a fraction of a second, then sharpened again, hard and iron. He stepped closer to the bars.
“I don’t regret anything I did or said,” Thomas responded, his voice coming through quietly yet heavy. “If I have to die for it, so be it.”
Saps lets out a sharp laugh, shaking his head.
“God, you sound just like him,” Saps said bitterly.
Thomas’s jaw tightened, but he didn’t budge, only stepping closer.
“Because he was right. He saw further than any of us.”
Saps grabs the bars again, almost lashing out.
“Don’t you dare. Don’t twist him into your prophet. He wasn’t supposed to be this. He was the vice president of Luminara, a protector. Not—”
He bit the words back, the name swelling behind his teeth.
His eyes flashed, sharp with recognition. For once, the mask slipped, and his voice carried heat.
“Flux died exactly who he was.”
The name reverberated through the cell, into the icy abyss.
“He never bent. Not for me, not for you, not for anyone,” Thomas snapped, the admission burning in his throat. “The fact that you can’t accept that proves you barely even knew him.”
Saps’s nails scraped against the iron.
“Is that how you see it?” Saparata’s voice was jagged, bitter. “You watched him rot from the inside out and called it conviction.”
“No,” Thomas bit out. “You saw him refuse to bend and called it corruption. That’s your failure, not his.”
Saparata’s laugh was sharp and broken. “You let him walk into fire and saw to his end.”
“It was at your request to fight,” Thomas snapped, his chest rising unsteady but hard. “He chose to die by your blade.”
“You think I wanted to see him perish? In my arms no less?” Saparata’s voice cracked despite himself, his grip on the bars going white.
Yes, he had asked to fight Flux, had stepped into the coliseum with the goal to kill him. But it was never about what Saparata wanted. The Islands were something greater to him, something Flux had tried to sour. Saps had no right to let his feelings get in the way of that.
Thomas’s expression flickered—anger, then something more fragile. His voice dropped.
“And yet… he always crawled back to you.”
The words struck harder than any blow. For a moment, neither spoke. Saparata’s throat burned, bitter and raw. He forced out an answer.
“He didn’t crawl back. He cornered himself, with you right behind him.”
Thomas’s eyes darkened. His foot shifted backwards, face wounded but unyielding.
“No. You never wanted to admit it, but in the end, it was you he chose.”
“You think he chose me? Don’t be ridiculous,” Saps let out a bitter, lifeless laugh. “He chose the fight. He chose the ruin. And he dragged me into it.”
The heat drained from the cell, leaving behind a crushing weight instead.
Saps saw himself in the reflection of the bars, blurry and stretched thin. He saw the bags under his eyes from the tireless nights, exhaustion, and tears.
“I was doing my duty,” Saparata finally muttered, almost to himself. “To protect the islands. To clean up the mess you and he left me with.”
Thomas almost chuckled, folding his arms. “So you did understand nobility.”
“What you two did wasn’t nobility,” Saparata snapped. “It was selfishness.”
The bars trembled faintly under his hands.
They were locked in a stalemate, both unwavering and resolute—something perhaps, they both learnt from Flux.
Perhaps it was pointless to have come.
Seeking to understand didn’t provide Saps any closure, only poured salt into wounds already carved open. There was no winning against Thomas in this. The Conspiracy had forced Saps to the opposite side, never even giving him even the chance to decide for himself.
When Saparata finally looked Thomas in the eyes again, he caught the smallest quiver at his lip.
Thomas exhaled shakily, and when he spoke again, it wasn’t with venom but rather, something brittle.
“At least you got to hold him to his end.”
Saps’ heart stammered in his chest. He didn’t answer, seeing Thomas’s hold tighten around himself.
“Please tell me, Saparata,” Thomas pressed, voice thinning. “Did he look content?”
It was strange.
Saps and Thomas would never agree on who Flux was, or the entire Conspiracy. They would never be on the same side again, not in this life or after. But their paths always converged at one point, with whatever Flux was to either of them.
Even in death, Flux still steered them. Still haunted them.
Flux’s loss was still fresh, the blood never truly washed from Saparata’s hands.
And Thomas—Thomas would have walked to the edges of the earth for him, throwing himself into every design, every detail, if only to keep Flux safe.
Only at Flux’s own request would Thomas let him go.
Saparata remembered the weight of the corpse in his arms, still warm. The face, vivid as day, imprinted behind his eyes.
Saps almost laughed, his eyes stinging.
“He smiled.”
The words scorched his throat, leaving him raw. Like giving Thomas that truth was tearing something out of himself.
Thomas closed his eyes. Whatever the answer meant to him, it only hollowed him out further, burning him alive from the inside. For a moment, it seemed like his knees might buckle.
“I guess I shall finally join him tomorrow,” he whispered.
“That you will,” Saparata said, resignation heavy in his throat.
Thomas opened his eyes again, steady but dim. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Saparata.”
“See you.”