Word Count: 1573

The day everything came to a screeching halt, Paris woke up with a headache.

This was not abnormal by any means, not these days at least, for his frequent exertions as a Senshi and a recurring case of insomnia tended to leave him with increasingly familiar such pains of the mind. He treated it as he always did, swallowing down three ibuprofen and steadfastly ignoring the spotty vision and the lightheadedness that went along with it as he stripped himself of his nightclothes and stumbled into the shower to get ready for his day.

After his shower, a glance into the mirror once the fog had dissipated as he stood at the sink brushing his teeth showed a face that was perhaps a bit too pale to be considered appropriately healthy, but Paris hardly spared it any thought. He spat the excess toothpaste out of his mouth, rinsed with water from the tap, and then pulled his hair back and pinned his bangs out of his face when they fell free. The only attention he gave to his ashen face was to pinch color into his cheeks as he grabbed his dance bag and trotted downstairs.

“Good morning, Precious,” Momma Gallo greeted him in her usual cheerful manner, pulling muffins out of the oven as she turned a brilliant smile onto him.

By the smell of the muffins Paris assumed them to be chocolate chip—normally his favorite. His stomach made an uncomfortable motion in his gut, half in longing and half in sickness. Instead of waiting for the muffins to cool, Paris went to one of the cabinets to dump a few protein bars into his bag.

“Morning, Momma,” he said.

She stared at him in obvious concern as she set the muffins on the stove top to cool. “Are you feeling alright, Precious?” she asked.

“Fine,” he answered simply. “Just a headache.”

“Maybe you should take the day off to get some rest,” she tried.

“Can’t,” he said as he reached into the refrigerator for a couple of bottles of water. “I have dance.”

“But you look-”

Paris interrupted her with a bland smile and a “I’ll see you when I get home” as he turned to make his way to the door. He crossed paths with Peter on his way through the living-room, but Paris barely gave the kid the chance to ask “Aren’t you gonna to have any muffins?” before he rushed through the foyer and left the house without another word.

He could have waited for Momma to finish with breakfast and gotten a ride from her, or called Ross to pick him up on the way in, or called Chris to drive him to the studio before class, but the day had only just begun and he’d already gotten more concerned looks and attempts to hold him back than he would have liked, and so Paris settled for making his way on his own. He walked down the Gallos’ long drive and pushed through the front gate, crossing the quiet road to amble down the sidewalk toward the bus stop.

It was a hot day. The sun wasn’t even at its highest and it was already beating down on him, causing an uncomfortably sticky sweat to break out along his forehead and the back of his neck. By the time the bus came, Paris had already broken into one of his water bottles and was in the midst of guzzling it down, staggering his way onto the bus to fight through the early morning rush that already crowded it. The only seat left was all the way in the back but he didn’t feel like fighting his way back there, so he settled for clinging to one of the bars at the front of the bus and swayed with each bump and turn of the road.

He changed bus routes once he was further into the city, and then walked a few blocks from his final stop to the studio. His headache persisted all the while. His vision blurred around the edges, his stomach took a few nauseating turns, and the heat of the day did nothing to cure him of his lightheadedness. He paused twice for breath, closing his eyes against a sudden spell of dizziness until he was sure he could move again without it getting the better of him.

“Paris,” someone greeted him when he entered the studio—one of the girls. She looked at him strangely, a sense of disquiet quickly bleeding into her expression. “Are you okay?”

“Fine,” he said again. He turned away before she could ask him anything else.

“You don’t look fine,” Ross told him as he passed. “What are you even doing here?”

“Dancing,” Paris replied.

Ross frowned and took him by the arm, pulled him into the corner of the room despite his protests and lowered his voice to keep their conversation private.

“I think you should go home,” he said.

Paris rolled his eyes. “Yes, Mother,” he answered sarcastically.

“Paris, I’m serious. Have you even looked at yourself this morning?”

Feeling mildly offended, Paris jerked his arm away. When the motion sent him stumbling back a step, he recovered quickly and tried to pretend as if he’d meant to do it.

“Will you just get off my back?” he forced out, glaring through the occasional dark spot that jumped into his vision. “I said I’m fine. So I’m a little tired, so what? I know what I can and can’t handle, okay? Stop babying me and let me do my job. I can look after myself.”

Ross looked like he wanted to argue. An uncharacteristic frown marred his face, sharpening the blue of his eyes and forming a little line between his brows that didn’t ease even after he’d nodded and let him go. Paris could feel those eyes on him as he chugged down more water and absently chewed on a protein bar, but no other word was said. The others kept their comments to themselves, and soon the room was filled with ballerinas and danseurs stretching and going through their barre exercises.

Paris kept his gaze determinedly averted as practice commenced. Occasionally he checked himself in the mirror, not to see how poorly he may or may not have looked, but to make sure his expression wasn’t showcasing his fatigue. He kept his look of intense focus in place even as his head spun and the heat rose—the air-conditioning in the room did not help him, though the others remained moderately comfortable even when their activity encouraged a light sweat.

He ate another protein bar and swallowed a few more pills during a break. Neither helped. The chocolate and peanut butter bar sat uncomfortably in his stomach, and the pain in his head increased with a vengeance. His breathing was perhaps a bit more labored than it should have been. No matter what he did, he never felt as if he were taking in enough air. His throat felt swollen and tight, his breaths raspy, and when he swallowed he thought it tasted sour, like the sickness was right there waiting to overtake him.

He prided himself on his ability, on his determination to ignore the discomfort. If he could dance through a flu-induced fever then he could dance through the fatigue—he could dance through anything. The more he suffered, the more the others looked at him as if he might break with the merest touch, the more he pushed himself to prove them wrong. He battled on, impatiently wiped the sweat from his brow and threw himself in to every step, every turn, every lift and twist and jump.

This was nothing. He’d been dancing his entire life—for as long as he could remember. He’d experienced his fair share of exertion in that time, had pushed and pushed and pushed until he knew what his limits were, and then he’d pushed beyond them and surpassed them until they formed anew. Compared to other events in his life, this was easy. This was safe.

If he could survive all that he’d seen, he could survive this.

He could survive anything.

But conviction wasn’t enough. Determination, zeal—neither of them could hold against the very real danger he was putting himself in. No, this wasn’t a battle against good and evil, between right and right. This wasn’t the violent spilling of blood or the destruction of one’s soul—not in the way he knew it. But it was no less damning. That was a truth he couldn’t even see, didn’t want to see, because once he did he would be forced to admit to it, and he didn’t know if he could do that. Not this time.

Paris stumbled out of a pirouette as the heat turned numbing and darkness began to creep further and further inward from the corner of his eyes. He tried to blink through it, wobbled forward to grip onto a barre with shaking hands, slouching over as he fought to breathe.

Through the mirror he could see the others stop to stare, Ross approaching him from behind. He saw his friend’s mouth move but heard none of the words he spoke, just the faint sound of a voice muffled as if under water.

The last thing Paris remembered was staring into his own terrified face. Then he fell, and darkness consumed him.

He never felt the ground.