Wild Tiger Chase - Chapter 36: Chapter 36

— Rafa —
Rafa opened and closed her hands, watching as her bandaged muscles bulged. She had felt it. During her sparring session with Léon, she felt the cosmic trace flowing through her veins again in a way she hadn't experienced since she was eighteen, more than ten years ago.
It was fleeting and lasted only a moment, but it happened. It happened, and now she was starting to feel the same old hope blooming in her chest again. The hope that one day, she'd see her companions again.
And she needed to stop.
Hoping would only hurt her again. Sapha and Sophi were dead, and there was nothing she could do about it. And still... Rafa looked at her palm and pretended to see orange crystals covering it. She closed her eyes and could almost remember her companions' voices calling to her; sweet voices, sweet sayings, and sweet moments that—
"Do you really need all that shit, Pipo?" Phillip asked.
The moment was broken.
"It's not poo," Pipo said, furrowing his brows. "It's water and earth, and it's mixed. Leo used to put mud on his face and called it a, uh, Heav... uh... ly?"
Rafa chuckled. "Heavenly?"
"Yes. Heavenly cure for his pores." Pipo turned around and thrust his little hands into a small puddle of mud, the aftermath of the storm from the night before. In the following moment, he raised two handfuls of mud and threw them against Phillip's chest, smiling a mischievous little smile. While he was at it, Pipo's fish companions floated back and forth the dark depths of the forest, bringing flowers and seeds to glue on Phillip's mud-covered shoulders.
"Well, at least your face will get all pure and clean once he's done," Rafa told Phillip.
He groaned. "It's really all I needed before dying."
Rafa's smile shrunk. Her tone was soft when she said, "Phil, oi. Raise that head, mate." She tapped a finger under his chin. When Phillip raised his eyes to meet hers, she smiled. "We'll find a way to help you. All right?"
Emotion glimmered in his eyes. Phillip cleared his throat and spent no more than a heartbeat in silence. Then, he smirked. "What, so you're saying this skin treatment won't save me?"
"Of course it will!" Pipo squealed, slapping more mud on Phillip's arms. "Bea and Boh told me, so it's true. My fishes. Bea and Boh. It's their names."
Phillip and Rafa shared a smile. Rafa had been watching Pipo and his companions help Phillip for the past hour, and it never ceased to amaze her how creative the little one could be and how patient Phillip was with children. If a kid tried to stick twigs on her hair and cover her face with mud and flowers, she might not be as indulgent as he.
She had to confess, though... Phillip's fever had been controlled and he hadn't blabbered nonsensical rubbish for the past ten or twenty minutes now. Maybe Pipo was helping him.
"I think you forgot a little spot right here, Partner," Phillip said, pointing at his mud-covered cheek.
Pipo giggled. "Well, that's a job for Legend-little."
"Legend-little?" Phillip laughed. "That your hero nickname?"
"Yes!" Pipo beamed. "Like Leo's!"
"Bring the mud, then... Legend-little."
"Oh, absolutely not." Rafa placed her hands on her waist, making Pipo freeze mid-action. "You kids had enough fun. Besides, we've been waiting here for an hour; it's time to go. Whatever's keeping those two gits, it's not as important as our lives."
Rafa took a deep breath. While Phillip and Pipo slept last night, she had tiptoed her way around their camp to see if Rob and Léon were okay. She couldn't find them. Her only assumption was that they were trying to solve their relationship problems. She just wished they would find a way to work through that conversation without drawing any unwanted attention.
Pipo cleaned his hands on Phillip's arm and lowered his eyes. "The barbarians are still looking for us."
"Exactly, Pipo." Rafa sighed. She was worried about her brother and about Léon too. "You can stay here if you want; I'll head out to find them. Shout if you need me." Rafa turned around slow enough to see the smirk in Pipo's lips as he crouched to get more mud—but before she could even finish the movement, Rafa hit a muscular wall of gentleness and bad decisions.
"We're back," Rob said.
Worry lines framed his dark eyebrows as he sat down on a raised root. Léon followed on his tracks and crouched before him, reaching for his jacket's collar. He carefully slid Rob's jacket off and pulled his arm closer so he could study the dark red on it.
"Oh, Bahlu," Léon mumbled.
The smell of blood filled Rafa's nostrils, and only then did she register the red trail running down the slit on Rob's arm.
"What happened?" Rafa asked. Her voice sounded harder than she'd intended.
Rob perched up. "Nothing that—"
"We left early this morning to scout ahead," Léon interrupted. "There are a lot of small groups of Barbarians in the forest. A group spotted us. Rob was shot trying to protect me."
Cold rippled through Rafa's body as her stomach sunk. "What?"
"Don't scare her, Tiger." Rob massaged the back of his neck. "It was just a scratch. Seriously. Besides, we managed to take down one of the smaller groups—we have an opening now for about one or two hours... or until the barbarians we took down decide to wake up"
"Let me see it," Léon said. His short-sleeved shirt was already missing a good chunk of fabric, but he still managed to rip another stripe.
As Léon cleaned his wound, Rob frowned. "What happened to you?"
All eyes turned to Phillip as he received a new layer of mud on the right side of his face.
"Pipo!" Léon said in a hard tone. "What do you think you're doing?"
"Leave him be, partner." Phillip opened his arms like a scale and smiled, cracking the already dried layer of mud on his cheeks. "It'll be good for my skin."
Rafa shook her head and tried to control the sad frown on her expression. "We should get going, then. The old-fashioned way, since Aíbetama is the only place I know how to reach with the step-through—and that won't be of any help for us."
"And I can't take us anywhere without my tigers," Léon piped in. "I don't know the pathways well enough to travel alone."
"Yes. We'll need to walk." Rob grimaced and got up. "If we leave now and be careful, we'll arrive in Cidade Santa in five days or so. Maybe six."
Léon massaged his chin and bit down on his lower lip. An idea crossed his eyes. "Wait. Not necessarily," he said, looking at Pipo. "Maybe it's time to teach my brother how to do the step-through. Do you think he can, Rafa?"
Her eyebrows almost reached her hairline. "He can certainly try—you'd just need to find a place safe enough to stay for some time."
Phillip grunted and huffed as he got up. He placed a heavy hand on Léon's shoulders and placed another on Rafa's. "Listen, Partners, if that involves me not walking... I'm in."
He frowned and kept his fist in the air for another couple of heartbeats. Then, Phillip lowered it.
"All good; they're gone." He huffed. "I can't believe you're forcing a sick man to patrol."
As he got up, his shadows crawled back to him, weaving his silhouette on the floor again. He looked at Léon, Rob, and Pipo a few meters away and nodded. Those three were tucked into a hollow tree trunk, trying to teach Pipo how to travel through his undimension, while Rafa and Phillip were on guard duty. Then and again, a detachment of barbarians passed through, and it was Rafa and Phillip's job to decide between fight, flee, or freeze.
This last time, they had been frozen for almost thirty minutes until the barbarians were finally gone.
The bones in Rafa's back popped when she got up. Holy shite, it was good to be on her feet again. Rafa listened for a moment; all around them, there were only the sounds of the forest. It was safe to continue their conversation.
"Oi, Phil?"
He cleaned the leaves and twigs from his clothes, being careful not to break too much of the dried mud pauldrons covering his shoulders. "Hum?"
"Can't you talk to Rio about it?" Rafa asked.
Phillip froze again. His eyes flicked between them as if looking for something only he could see. "Why are we still talking about this?"
Rafa sighed. Sometimes Phillip seemed to have quite a low opinion of himself—there was no other reason for his suspicion. It was almost as if he doubted she could be really trying to know him better.
"It's... uh. Blimey, I don't know. We're alone on a patrol. Might as well chat, no? Besides..." She sighed and jerked a finger to her right, resuming their walking. "You seemed so sad about the whole breaking up thing. I don't know him personally, but there must be a reason why Rio gave you the boot."
Phillip gritted his teeth. "He didn't give me the boot; it was the other way around."
"Nobody cares, mate. Seriously." Rafa fitted her hands into her pockets. "Just talk to him."
Phillip clicked his tongue and sighed. There was a vagueness in his expression that seemed to place him in another space and time. For a long while, Phillip remained lost in his thoughts, until he stopped in his tracks and locked their eyes.
"You think?" he asked. "After he led me on for four years, you think there's still a reason to talk things through?"
The question came out as sincere, not accusatory—but it made Rafa feel bad all the same.
If she needed to be honest, she wasn't the best person to give relationship advice. As a panromantic, she had had several crushes over the years, but as a career-oriented woman, she never had much interest in serious relationships. As a demisexual, she had never actively looked for sex while she was single. Sure, Rafa had a girlfriend once, almost seven years ago—and while she missed Yanna sometimes, remembering how great it felt to go down on the only person she had connected with on a deeper level, Rafa never missed how confusing it was to try and decode another human's wants and needs while in a relationship with them.
The two women had left a lot of unfinished business behind when they decided to break up. Nowadays, Rafa didn't even talk to her anymore, despite how close they had once been. What right did she have to tell Phillip to talk with his ex?
Phillip scoffed before her silence. "Listen, I'm not saying I wouldn't try to talk to him. I'd be lying if I said I don't miss that little fuck."
Rafa hummed. She waited for him to continue; when it was clear he wouldn't, she said, "But?"
He licked his lips and took a deep breath, keeping it locked in his chest for long moments of silence. Then, Phillip exhaled, saying,
"But he never once said he loved me, Rafa. And I'm really tired of not feeling loved." He peeked over his shoulder, and Rafa knew he was looking at Léon. "I had that once—someone loving me—and I was a fucker about it." Phillip looked forward again, soft green eyes focused on the path ahead. "But it's a relief to know I'll be a better boyfriend the next time it happens. That I'm..." He sighed and shrugged. "Ready to love back, or whatever. Cause Rio might be who I want, but he can't give me the relationship I need." He bit the side of his thumb. "Or some shit like that, Rafa," he mumbled. "I don't know, partner. I guess I miss my therapist."
She nodded, not knowing why. Had Yanna even loved her? Had Rafa been a good girlfriend? Had she made Yanna happy?
She couldn't know, could she?
Rafa was really inexperienced, wasn't she?
"Sorry, Phil. I think I gave you a rubbish piece of unsolicited advice back there."
Phillip chuckled. It was a weak and hollow sound tied to short, wet coughings. "Talking is good, you're not wrong about that. It's just..." Phillip shrugged. "I don't think I can stomach having the same conversations with him. Again. But if he shows some interest, well... that's another story, isn't it? A guy can hope."
She offered him a smile. "Absolutely."
Phillip sat down. No matter what Pipo's mud had done to his fever, he was still sick, and it showed. He placed his hands on his knees and breathed in; the sound showed his lungs were covered in phlegm.
"Well, what about you?" Phillip cleared his throat and batted a fist against his chest.
"What about me?" She rested a palm on his forehead and another on hers, comparing their temperatures. He was still feverish, but it seemed to be controlled.
Phillip shrugged. "I don't know. Don't you want to tell me anything? This is how conversations go, right?" He smirked. "I tell you something, and you tell me something in return?"
"Why," she drawled, mocking him. "I don't know. Is it?"
"C'mon. You basically know my whole life by now. Won't you even tell me who you like?"
She lowered her eyes and thought about Yanna again. Then, she remembered Yanna's wife—and her will to talk disappeared. "Hum. I like plants. Does that count?"
"Affectionately, Rafa..."
"Yes?"
"Fuck you."
She laughed. "I'm serious! I was voted green thumb of the office for two years straight."
"You're ridiculous."
Her laugh was longer and louder this time. "I love ferns, especially. They look beautiful no matter where you put them, and they always bring this... this freshness to the rooms you put them in."
"All right, got it." He clicked his tongue. "You don't want to tell me."
"I don't have anything to tell you," she corrected. "It's been years since I was romantically attracted to someone. It happened only once for me."
Phillip stared at her in silence. He opened his lips to answer, but a voice interrupted them.
"Oi. You two." Rob rapped his knuckles on one of the trees as if knocking on a door. He looked from Rafa to Phillip as his eyebrows furrowed. "Shouldn't you two be patrolling?"
"I'm a sick man, partner." Phillip crossed his arms and huffed. "You have no shame putting me to work like this."
"Right." Rob rolled his eyes. "Well, you lucked out. Leo thinks Pipo is ready; c'mon, we're about to head out."
Rafa and Phillip shared a pointed look as Rob walked away.
"Let's go, Phil. I bet Kali will find a way to help you." Rafa offered him a hand.
He sighed and placed his fingers on hers. "Let's hope Léon's mom will have forgiven me. She always hated my guts."
"And I honestly can't imagine why," Rafa said with a wink.