Homehow he had managed to run, despite the injury to his pelvis. Not just run, but excape being captured. He didn't understand how. Either way, it had left him tired, and more run down than he had been as the battle went on. He could tell himself he wasn't, and that he never could be, that the great Bismuthite was no weakling all day long, but it didn't change things. It didn't change how momentarily damaged his self-truth was, or fix the monumental dent to his pride. It didn't change the cold grip on his heart.

Bismuthite stared in to his reflection on the tile floor of the condemned store where he slumped, pink eyes wide and un-seeing. He was trying to register just what had happened. He had been focused on his fight with Gunn. He had to admit, picking a fight with a Super Senshi probably hadn't been the smartest choice, but the two had a history. (short history, but hey...) He had given hits, and taken them. Downplayed the pain until in the end a particular hit to his pelvis left him with no choice but to stay on the ground. It was that or show the pain that he was adamant not to show.
No. there was no pain. None! Never had been!
What was he saying? It had hurt like a b***h. It felt like his legs had been asleep and someone came by and was poking them with a fork. only ten times worse. Perhaps it was better that Bismuthtie didn't know how close he had come to getting tranquilized. Wolframite had saved him from that fate.


Wolframite. Bismuthite remembered turning around and seeing Wolframite standing there in the oddest way, as if someone was holding him back. He knew now that some senshi, invisible at the time, had been there. Then Bismuthite had watched Wolframite sink to the ground. Bismuthite trembled with the memory. The fear, the anger, all seeped back in to him. The feeling of his blood running cold and the panic.. Then the senshi had revealed herself. Bismuthite would remember that face. That senshi would pay.

But what of Wolframite? Where had they taken him? What were they planning on doing to him? Bismuthite still didn't know about the capture of the others. He had been only aware of those three - Leto, Wolframite, and Gunn - and the noise around them. The fighting. He didn't know that Tanzanite was gone too. Perhaps for now that, too, he was better off not knowing. His breathing was already hitching as he thought about what might be happening to his Wolframite who had come to save him. His Ladon.
Bismuthite was hunched over now, forehead against to cold black floor, eyes tightly shut and teeth bared, as if truly in physical pain. Bismuthite, no, Billy didn't know how to deal with feelings like these.

He has always dehumanized everyone in his mind, turned them in to objects that he lorded over. He was above everyone and most of all, above caring for said things. In the time he had come to know Ladon, he had been challenged to change his views, and had met that challenge. It came with a price however. And that price was vulderable emotion.

And thus, with a more humanistic view Bismuthite had allowed himself to view Tanzanite in a more human way than he normally would have regarded someone with. In fact, despite whatever slight age difference there might have been, he looked to her as a kind of parental figure. If not for her, then figuratively speaking, Bismuthite would not have been born. And she was high in the chain of authority. A dedicated, knowledgeable person who had worked for what she had, climbed through the ranks.. She was someone he could respect, and probably the closest anyone had come to being seen as above even him

But Billy truly cared for Ladon, and in more than just a trophy or boyfriend kind of way. Never had Billy enjoyed the company of anyone, or found it as tolerable as he did Ladon. Ladon was fun. Billy could easily find and prod at all the boy's insecurities and other things that made him squirm uncomfortably...and then go on the try and fluster the boy with flattery and flowery verbal displays. Displays that showed a more open, playful, side to the usually guarded regality Billy tried to keep up. Billy was comfortable with Ladon. He realized that he didn't want to be without the one person who let him act so freely. And then there was the fact that Ladon was Wolframite. This might have destroyed a little of Billy's view of his boyfriend's naivete and innocence, but it had certainly made him respect him more. Maybe it had been that little spat at Aree's. Maybe it was actually observing Wolframite on patrols.

Either way, there was a bond there. A bond that made the thoughts that assailed his mind unbearable. No! No! They couldn't have him! Either of them! Just- No, no, no, no, no, no, NO! It wasn't possible it wasn't happening, damnnit! He'd kill those damn senshi if they didn't come back alive and in once piece. Damnit, he'd kill them anyway! These thoughts, as well as a flash game of 'worst case scenario' tore at his mind so fast and so violent that he couldn't stop the scream that came and echoed out into the darkness. A fist pounded the floor, fingers clawed at it. He screamed long and hard, until his voice was hoarse, and his cheeks damp.
And for the longest time, before silence once again consumed, there was the echo of a dull, whispered, 'no.'