Fade Into Darkness

Dimitri stood in front of Dominika, things were now different for Dimitri. He didn't talk about a lot of things, but he sure thought about them. He stood there, his expression remaining at an absolute neutral while his girlfriend confided in him. At least, that's what he assumed they were still. He waited for her to finish. "Y'said what y'said." Dimitri plainly stated. "What'd done is done, ain't nothin' we can do 'bout it now." Dimitri tried to push that topic out of the way, it was an intensely sore spot for him.

He did feel some calling, however. "I ain't goin' nowhere. I'm here, in front've you, right now." Dimitri said, taking a step closer to her. "I don't want'ya to think anythin' is goin' on, that anythin' is goin'ta happen, y'know? I just need'ja to understand that-" Dimitri paused, dead in the middle of speaking. Suddenly his expression darkened, as a connection formed in his head.

"Did you say slippin'?" Dimitri asked, now taking a step away from the daughter of Jupiter. "Dominika, I gotta ask you, did'jou talk to Heath 'bout this?" Dimitri asked. His tone was less kind and caring than it previously was. He had to know. He just had to.

Dimitri listened to her entirely before he spoke again. His words seemed to gain him so little lately, while his actions had been all that counted. "You trust him over me." Dimitri's voice had gone silent for the moment. "Was- was it him in New Zealand?" Dimitri asked. He thought it hadn't bothered him, seeing Dominika dance with someone else. But it called to him now, knowing that it was Heath. "I was with Andrew. And he was tellin' me that stuff. And we saw you dancin'. Was it with him?"

"Dominika, this ain't me slippin'. It ain't me fadin' away or goin' nowhere. This is me bein' who I need to be. I've screwed up too many times, lost too much 'cause've my own mistakes. Let other people lose things, when I shoulda made sure that didn't happen. This ain't slippin' or fallin'. This is me understandin' the real world, how things really work. This is how I survive. This is how we survive. If I don't do this, what happens next? When I take people with me, they're my responsibility. I wasn't ready. But I am now. And that's what this is." He couldn't get her words out of his head now. And he stepped back.

"Does any of that matter now though? You don't trust me anymore." Dimitri said. "You think've me like I'm gonna do somethin'. Like I'm gonna hurt you." It hit Dimitri like a boulder being flung out of a catapult. Dimitri's eyes lowered down, and they fixed themselves to her leg. It was his fault it was gone. He looked back up at her. Suddenly he realized it. He didn't deserve her trust. She trusted him and he took her leg from her.

"There is no who I was, and who I'm turning into, or even a who I'm gonna be. There's just me, Dominika. I get that you don't like this, but this is what it needs to be. That cyclops? If I didn't do what I did, I'd've died, right there. Then who knows what would've happened? Another cyclops coulda been on you or Nestor instantly. And then after one of you were gone? It'd be a one on three. I had to do what I did. And if I wasn't workin' on bein' this? I wouldn't've been able to. This is how we live, Dominika. This, right here. This is how we take care of our people, keep them alive. This is how we take down Lear. You have to be ready, Dominika. You have to be. If you ain't, they'll come for you. They always do." Dimitri spoke, adamantly.

"The real world ain't 'bout having somethin' happen to you. It's'bout lettin' somethin' happen. It's when somethin' happens and it's your fault, Dominika." Dimitri's head tilted, his face unshaven and his hair unkempt. "Nestor's eye coulda been saved. My parents. The house. Ariadne. Maybe even Truman." Dimitri stopped talking, and an eerie silence took over, before he finally looked back at her. "I made that call that night, y'know. We went further up the hill 'cause people trusted me when I said t'do so. And then? You lost your leg. That's on me. If it weren't for me you'd still have your leg, Dominika. That's the real world."

"Fact is, I begged you to stay that night. You stayed for me, and this is what I brought you back to. At the time, it felt terrifyin' to go another day without you. I yearned for you. I wanted to spend every moment with you. That's how I felt that night, and holdin' you there, I took somethin' away from you, Dominika." Dimitri had turned away at this point, he couldn't look at her while he said this. "I took away your choice. 'Cause I remember, y'know, that y'said you were ready t'go. After that, there'd be no pain, no loss, no sadness, no hurt. No nothin'." Dimitri explained. Everything seemed so clear.

"And now? I don't even try to feel all those things. I still love you, Dominika, but I live knowin' how much safer you are when you ain't with me. That the more I'm in your life, the more you're at risk. That is the truth, Dominika. That's me, that's who I am. The truth is, when I go out there? I want somethin' to find me. I want things to go wrong. And that ain't me goin' crazy. It ain't me slippin'. That's just who I am. And because of who I am, people will live. Others who can't do this, they won't have to, because I'll do it for them."

"Maybe I thought it was best you didn't know that, but, that's who I am." Dimitri stated, as a final declaration. "It ain't safe for us to be together, Dominika. It never was."

There was a lot of things Dimitri wanted to say to her. Things that he didn't understand at this point. But Dimitri had made his choice. He didn't want to lose Dominika, but at this point, everything had been placed down. It had taken every last ounce of courage Dimitri held in order to say what he did, and hearing her response broke what was left of his resolve. But it would rebuild again, and he would do what he needed to do. He would survive.

To say anything would only make it worse for Dominika. To say he would miss her, or that he loved her, he knew the truth that saying that wouldn't be for her; it would be something he would be doing for himself. Dimitri didn't turn back to look at her, he just couldn't risk that. It was at that moment that something happened to Dimitri, something he thought he was passed. His eyes began to feel irritated, and then they began to leak, profusely. He hadn't truly cried in so long. The wretched emotions were so common in his daily life that it never made a difference. It made him angry that in his one moment when he needed to be strong, he wasn't doing it. But he knew he could start building up again. He just had to make it away.

He wiped his tears as he walked away, heading to a place he was in debt to. The place his kind commonly considered home; Camp Half-Blood. There was so much he wanted to build, and give, and be there for. But in the heat of the moment, he'd made the call to put her safety first. Staying in Camp Jupiter was more safe than running from coast to coast.

This was the right call. No matter how much it tormented him, at least she was alive.

"For the record." Dimitri's voice was shaky, but he forced himself to stabilize, he wouldn't fall here. "I- I didn't have a right to do what I did." Dimitri's voice stabilized. "On Temple Hill, I told you that you didn't wanna kill that bein', that sick and twisted monster. It ain't my right to keep you from that. Fact is, if he lived any closer to here? I'd just kill him with my own hands." The demigod walked away, truly departing.