topino | For Ahn

For Ahn

Each week after the farmer's market, Nicky feels much more confident about cooking for his friends in Darrow. While Rowan has a standing invitation to wander over, the others are more of a challenge that brings Nicky back to cooking in different countries, learning about the local cuisine, and then trying to impress. Tonight, he's brought Ahn over to show off his bibimbap, which he's been working on perfecting for over seventy years.

Yes, it's been a while, but he thinks it will do the trick.

Before Ahn comes over, Nicky makes sure that anything private (or, rather, concerning) is hidden away. That means the sword, Joe's journal, but also the sniper rifle he's building all go in a locked dresser in the bedroom. With that no longer needing to be worried about, Nicky returns to the kitchen, with the door unlocked, eager to have the house smelling of a homecooked meal by the time Ahn arrives.

He knows there's plenty to learn and improve on, and he's hoping that Ahn won't be stingy with any of his feedback when it comes to the meal.

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"Just water," Ahn answers as he sits, elbows heavy on the table as he leans forward to watch Nicky cook. This is genuinely exciting, and while he has the urge to get up and help with the cooking, Ahn isn't above just simply waiting for the food to eventually appear in front of him.

"How did you make it? Did you find a recipe?"

Nicky gets Ahn a glass of cool water, setting it down before he returns to tending to the pot, as though nursing a fussy child who requires some attention. "A recipe? No, no, I don't have my book with me," he says, as if that's the only place he could get them.

"This is from memory, from the last time I made it. It's been a very long time," he admits, "but I've always thought that it doesn't matter what you use, so long as the quality of the ingredients is good."

Ahn laughs a little because sometimes Nicky makes him feel completely useless in most aspects of his life. He'd just switched out Sungmo's highly competent nature for Nicky, it seems.

"I can barely make bibimbap on my own, this is unfair. When did you learn to make it?"

"I'm a man of the world," he says, with an enigmatic and amused smile on his face, since he can't say that he's been perfecting his cooking for over nine centuries and that of course he should be good at what he does. "I travelled to Korea years ago, and I have sought out ingredients since then."

"It is practice," he says, serious as anything. "Would you like to help?" he offers, seeing the way Ahn seems to want to learn more. "I can teach you how to properly chop vegetables, and it will mean we eat quicker."

It's often easier to grumpily accept Nicky's explanations for why he knows what he does -- it's easier than feeling jealous of all the life experiences Ahn hasn't had yet. Maybe one day he too will be able to travel around the world and learn other languages.

"I'll help," he agrees, happy to get up and assist. It makes him feel less like a burden, at least, as he stands at the counter next to Nicky, looking around for a knife. "And how is there a proper way to chop vegetables? You just cut them?"

Nicky brightens when Ahn agrees, reaching into his knife drawer to find a paring knife. It will not do the same work as the chef's knife in his hand, but it will still do the trick. He slides over some carrots for Ahn and nods towards them.

"We're going to make very small cuts," he explains, tapping on the carrots. "And if you were using a big knife like this, you would hold it here," he indicates where his index finger is under the knife, "with a good grip on the handle before a rocking motion. With that knife, it will be more sharp little stabs, with a final press of the blade to the cutting board."

He taps under it. "There is a wet cloth under here, to keep it from moving."

Oh, so there is a proper way to chop vegetables. Ahn takes in Nicky's instruction, watching attentively to make sure he gets it right. It seems like a lot just for some carrots, but he isn't the one with actual cooking experience.

"I see," he says, then stabs into the carrot before pressing down. The result is...a much larger slice of carrot than looks normal, and Ahn laughs. "I don't think that's right."

"Using a paring knife is something you can do once you're more experienced," he admits, easily shifting the knife in his hands to twirl it a little, offering it handle side out to Ahn, with an index finger pressed over the length of it. "Here. Let's trade," he suggests.

It might end up with a cut finger or two, but it's the proper way to learn, and Nicky feels very strongly about giving Ahn the best lesson he possibly can.

"You're showing off," Ahn accuses with a pout, but he's impressed all the same by Nicky's knife skills. Maybe it isn't as impressive as it looks, but it's a lot more than Ahn could do or ever even try to do.

He's careful, he always is, but Ahn has become comfortable, too, around certain people. Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji, Aggie, they know about his power and are aware. Nicky doesn't know, and Ahn isn't sure why he hasn't spoken to him about it yet, especially because he's so comfortable around the hyung.

That's a problem, and one Ahn isn't thinking of when he takes the knife Nicky is offering, too eager to try and get on with it that he touches Nicky's finger and the back of his hand, and none of the meditation and practice he's had with Lan Wangji and Wei Wuxian has prepared him for a completely unexpected touch. It's why he's training with them, but, well. Training that he isn't sure works yet only goes so far, and--

there is a stabbing in his side, his lungs, and the pain radiates throughout his body as a woman's face hovers and fades as the pain focuses in again, but he can feel it knit up, feel the wound close and oh, there, next to him

--Ahn coughs out a cry of pain, taking deep gasping breaths when he comes back to himself. He's on his knees, one hand on Nicky's kitchen floor and the other clutching his side where a phantom pain is rapidly fading. What was that? What had Nicky been through? And why had it actually hurt?

One minute, they're joking and chopping vegetables. Nicky has even started to give Ahn some advice on how to handle a bigger knife to avoid cutting himself, but suddenly he's on the floor on his knees, gripping at his side. Nicky quickly checks for blood, but there's none, which means he doesn't have to run for his first aid kit.

Still, he grips Ahn's shoulder firmly and gets down on his knees by him, staring at him with concern. "Ahn? Dongsaeng? Please, speak to me. What did you do? What happened?"

Nicky's voice cuts through Ahn's shock, his breath coming hard even though the pain is just about gone. He shifts to sit on the floor, staring at Nicky with wide eyes as he tries to process exactly what he's just seen.

"I saw you," he explains, wincing as he thinks about the pain again. That's truly a first for him, feeling it that way, and he has to touch his own side again, just to make sure it doesn't hurt.

Ahn closes his eyes against the onset of tears and leans back against the cabinets, wondering if his life is always going to be like this; fits of normal living until he's reminded that he can be anything but. "I should have told you before but we're friends and I didn't want it to be strange. When I touch people, I can see their memories. I saw yours. When you were in...a hospital? Someone was hurting you. And I saw your husband, he was lying there too."

There is a change that goes over Nicky. He's not expressive or emotive like some others. Definitely not like Joe. Still, he eases back to his heels as he tips his head to study Ahn, not blinking as he processes what it is that he's seen.

He can see memories, he says, and while he's been in many hospitals and labs, there are few that he and Joe have been in together. He thins his lips as he presses them together, wondering how much he should give in return. On his feet, he fetches a glass of water and sets it on the ground beside Ahn, careful not to touch him. Who knows what else he will see, and Nicky is still debating how much to tell him.

"You are doing more than seeing them," he says, his voice calm and even. "You're feeling it," he quietly points out.

Nicky is taking the admission in a much calmer manner than Ahn expected. He knows things are different here in Darrow and that he's not necessarily as strange or as singular as he used to be, but Ahn has spent most of his life feeling like a monster for what he can do. It's hard to shake.

Ahn sniffs and pulls the sleeves of his sweatshirt down over his hands before wiping tears out of his eyes. "I did feel it," he agrees, and is grateful to see that Nicky has no only brought him water, but is taking care to keep his distance.

"I don't normally feel things, I only see them," he explains, voice small, "but that was a lot of pain, hyung." Ahn thinks, maybe, that he hasn't felt that much pain since he was a child and fell seven stories in Sungmo's arms. "What happened to you?"

Nicky cannot comfort him in the way he might with others, because it would mean touching him again. It breaks his heart to see him so distraught, especially when it is because of him. This is because of his memories, of Merrick, he's sure.

The question is there, hanging in the air. Now it matters what he decides -- whether it will be the truth or a lie. He is stuck in Darrow, but others know his secret. Klaus and Rowan, but none else. Ahn has his own gifts, one he has kept silent, though. "I was taken, with Joe, and we were experimented on," he explains carefully, turning back to the food so it doesn't burn.

He suspects they will need sustenance soon.

"Tortured," he says, a better word for what happened.

Ahn moves to the table to sit in his previous chair, and takes a long drink of water as he watches Nicky and takes in what he's just said. He has the memory of Nicky's pain now, and though he knows it will fade in time just like any other, Ahn has unlocked something Nicky may not want to talk about. He cannot blame him for that, either.

Torture. Ahn has seen a lot of terrible things, glimpses of the absolute worst of what humans can do to each other. To think Nicky has suffered so makes the idea harder to face, and he can't help but want to know more even though he's unsure how to ask.

"Was it because...it felt like--like--" Flustered and rapidly losing his control over his English, Ahn pauses and forces himself to try again. "You were getting better, very fast."

Nicky breathes in deeply and sits on the opposite side of the table, but not before he digs into his cupboards for a big bottle of red wine. He puts it down on the table with a glass to start drinking, but on the other side is the paring knife he had been using.

Without saying anything, he drinks back half his glass, and then slices into the meat of his forearm until it opens and bleeds, right into the palm cupping his arm. It's not a deep wound and Nicky is old, very old, so it heals quickly.

"You have a special talent. So do I."

Ahn waits, and watches Nicky, thinking he will get an answer in time. However, it's a very different way of answering the question that Nicky provides him with, and Ahn is startled into a few choices curses that Jisoo would smack him for if she ever heard them coming out of his mouth.

"Are you crazy? You didn't have to do that!" Ahn protests, half standing and leaning over the table to take a look at Nicky's arm to make sure it's okay.

Knowing Nicky can heal and actually seeing it right in front of him are two entirely different things, but the proof of it strips away Ahn's power of speech as he watches the skin simply...not be cut any more.

"That was disgusting," Ahn says, and while he's grimacing thanks to what he's just witnessed -- and the blood left behind -- there is a touch of awe in his voice along with it. "But amazing."

Nicky smooths his palm over the skin, which is fully healed now. He runs a napkin over it to dab up any of the blood that's left over. "I don't know how you feel about your ability, but mine is something I keep very quiet," he says, which is a confession as much as it is a warning that he doesn't want it getting out.

He trusts Ahn, of course, but it bears saying.

"I will die one day. One day, this will not work, but until then, if you hurt me or kill me, I will heal. It's how I have lived, for over nine hundred years."

"I won't tell," Ahn murmurs, a promise he knows he can keep as much as he now knows Nicky won't tell about his own power.

Ahn looks back up at Nicky when he says how old he is, and frowns. "No wonder you act like an old man all the time. And--wow," Ahn lets the syllable trail and he sits back as he comes to a realization. "That sword, that wasn't your family sword, was it? That was yours. Hyung, you're so old."

Nicky refills the wine, because he heals everything, including any damage done by alcohol, so if he doesn't do this quickly, then it's not going to have much of an impact at all. He snorts mildly at Ahn's accusation that he is an old man. "I'm 951," he says, "born in 1069. Of course I'm an old man. At home, I was the second oldest man in the world," he informs him.

He isn't just a grandfather, but one multiple times over.

His smile turns wry, overshadowed by some regret. "It is mine, yes. From when I fought in the Crusades." Then, a thought occurs to him. "If you can see memories, then you are lucky all you saw was Merrick."

Those are numbers much beyond Ahn's comprehension; knowing Aggie is about three hundred years old is hard enough to understand, but Nicky eclipses that.

Ahn makes a pained face at the mention of the memory again, and wonders how it might work with someone of his age. Surely with nearly a thousand years, there's more pain and hurt to be had? But why had he seen only that?

"Maybe I'm lucky. Maybe...was it your most recent bad memory? When I touch people, I always see the worst thing they've been through, or the worst thing they remember. If I read any objects it can be random, but people..."

Ahn shakes his head. "People can do a lot of terrible things to each other. It always imprints on your soul."

Nicky raises a brow, because fighting Keane with Joe and being shot in the mouth might contend for a worse memory, but it's really splitting hairs at that point, to a level that he doesn't think he needs to clarify. "It was a recent very bad memory, but not the only one," he says. "Every death hurts," he confesses. "Just because I heal, does not mean the pain vanishes."

"How long have you had this gift?" he asks, pouring a new glass of wine, tipping it to Ahn. "Do you drink? Does it help or hurt?"

Because if they're going to talk about terrible things, he needs the booze. "I've done many awful things," he says. "I killed my husband. Many times."

Ahn stares, then takes the glass and drinks down a good helping of wine. He's more used to soju and rice wines, but this will do. Eventually he'll get drunk enough to try to comprehend Nicky dying a lot and killing his husband a lot, too.

"I discovered it when I was five," he answers, "I'm not sure how I got it, but my guardian hyung thinks it was because he and I got hurt really badly the same night our parents died." Ahn grimaces at the memory, and takes another sip of wine. "There was a fire in our apartment building, and my parents died. Hyung was a neighbor, and he...he grabbed me and jumped off the seventh floor to save us. When I woke up, I had this power."

He stares at the table for a long moment, allowing the press of the panic and pain from that night weigh him down as it always does. Trying to ignore it never works, and now there's the added bonus of thoroughly missing Sungmo.

When Ahn looks at up at Nicky again, he purses his lips. "Why did you kill your husband? That's not very romantic."

The way it sounds, it's almost as if the universe had wanted to protect Ahn, or give him the ability to prevent it. Or, maybe, it's about the aftercare, dealing with the emotional burden of such tragedies. Either way, it is a lot to put on a single five year old.

He'll ask Ahn about protocol soon, how he wants to be touched or approached, but first, he has to explain him and Joe. He's smiling, ruefully, fondly. "I went to war, the Crusades, because I was taught to hate a certain group of people. Joe, Yusuf," he clarifies, "he was one of them. The love of my life, on that battlefield. I was unwashed, unlearned, and unsympathetic. I killed him. He killed me. Three times, at least," he says fondly, as if telling a story about a meetcute.

"It was destiny that we both died and resurrected together. We've been together ever since." His smile turns pained, though, because, "Well, until here."

Ahn is slightly horrified at the very notion of Nicky and his husband killing each other over and over, but fascinated all the same. He thinks he should know what the Crusades are - the term is familiar but Ahn had never been the best at paying attention in school. He does know enough to find the idea of Nicky being older than the entire Joseon dynasty crazy.

"That's a long time to be together," Ahn says. "Was he the other man with you, in that lab? I think I saw him."

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