"I'm sorry I'm not as good as him."

Sitting beneath an orange tinted sky and staring into the horizon, Cain's eyes dim whilst he leans back in his chair. It was quite convenient that the door to the rooftop had been left unlocked, with an unused desk chair leaned against the wall beside it. Almost like the psychic frequented this place.

"I'm just...not sure of that, anymore."
His grip on his phone tightened, the serenity of the sunset reflecting in his eyes nowhere near indicative of what lie behind them in his mind.
"...Thanks for listening to me. It's getting late, I'll call you when I can tomorrow, alright? Alright. Bye."

He disconnects from the call, resisting the temptation to toss his phone off the roof. His temper had been getting harder and harder to control in recent weeks, struggling to keep any cracks from forming in his façade. The stress of what had gone down just a few weeks before wasn't going away any time soon. Coming close to death once more would have the same effect on any teen, hero or not. Of course, there was someone close enough to him to notice the strain on his mind.

"Cain."

Said empath jolted out of his thoughts, spinning his gaze towards the intrusion to his quiet time. "Oh...Austin, Dex. Guess I didn't feel you coming."

"That just confirms our suspicions. There's something wrong, isn't there?"

Standing before him were two fellow students. Well, one student, and one...uh...Cain wasn't quite sure what Dex truly was yet. Regardless, both of them were technically 'his boyfriend'.

Dexter stood slightly ahead of Austin, and he was certainly the most attention-grabbing. Rather than skin, he seemed to be a being made of the vast emptiness of space itself, littered with infinite twinkling stars that pulsed with life. Looking at him was to look at a serene galaxy unlike ours.

Austin stood just behind him, peering around his broader shoulders with honey-hued eyes from behind golden locks. Whilst Dex was mostly themed around the darker end of the color spectrum, Austin seemed to be the opposite with his pale-ish skin. Further polarizing the two, Dexter stood as if he wasn't ashamed of himself in the slightest, even if he wasn't exactly wearing any clothing, while Austin was covered near completely with sagging clothes and hands hidden within his sleeves. It was obvious his outfit was too big for him, but he was more than likely much too comfortable with it to get something that fit properly.

"You've been coming up here a lot recently, and...well, that phone call didn't sound too friendly."

After tucking his phone into his cloak, Cain rubbed his neck sheepishly. "You uh, heard that, huh? Listen, you don't have to-"

"Yes, we do. You're obviously stressed out, and we think you need to talk about it. That, and you want to, right?"

"...I hate how you two can read me so well." The psychic looked down in unfounded shame. He had spent every day of his life working to hold back both his quirk, and by extension, his thoughts and feelings. He had always bottled everything up, which worked alright until he joined the hero business. Now, he felt guilty just by letting his feelings be known. Everyone else was just as stressed as he was, right? Why bring them further down by bothering them with his problems? They were his; he needed to keep them to himself. He had to.

"There you go again! Cain, snap out of it. You're worrying us, you know? You think we can't tell when you're beating yourself up like this?" Austin took a step forwards, giving Cain a stern yet worried glare much as a mother would to a child, which only furthered Cain's embarrassment.

"I'm sorry, I just..." He struggled to come up with an excuse. Two sets of eyes burning holes in his head made it hard to think. Eventually he sighed, standing up but keeping his gaze on the ground. "I'm not used to sharing my feelings. That, and I just don't know how to put them to words. It's hard." He said, starting to slowly pace around the roof whilst the others watched him expectantly.

"No one said it'd be easy,-and no one said you had to deal with it alone." Dexter finished Austin's thought, their synchrony both worrying and reassuring the empath. "I know, I know. It, uh...means a lot that you two care this much. It really does. I guess that the least I can do is tell you."

Cain soon comes to a stop at the edge of the roof, leaning against the railing and staring out into the sunset. After Austin and Dexter joined him, he closed his eyes and took a deep breath. What was the best way to do this? How much should he tell them? Just thinking about it stressed him out.

"...I guess I've just been questioning a lot recently. Questioning why villains keep attacking us. Are they scared of us? What we could become? Are they just trying to demoralize everyone by killing a school full of kids? And what is the government even doing right now, about all of this? We've lost two school buildings, and the pro heroes could hardly save us both times! I'm tired of this! I've lost too many idols in the past two years. We couldn't even save our teacher, and the guy who killed him broke into MY room and tried to kill me!" The psychic's aura pulses with his outburst and he has to reel it back in. "If it weren't for Kenjiro, I wouldn't be here anymore. Because of what? Because that bastard took pleasure in making me lose my temper and hurting me?"

"...No. No, I almost died because I held back. I've always held back. I've never fought any of you, or any villain with everything I've got."

He opens his eyes, them glowing bright. Austin was about to say something, but Cain continued.

"Every day of my life. Every day of my life, I've worked to hold back. To set up restraints. Every day I've tried my very best to suppress everything, just to protect everything I love. To protect my family, to protect my friends, to protect you. If I had started holding back sooner, maybe I..." He trails off, shaking his head and silently cursing himself for going on a tangent. "No. You don't need to know about that."

"Cain, I..."
"Know about what? Cain, if I may be so bold, it sounds like that you're hiding something from us. Something that's still hurting you."

"I-I......yeah. It hurts. But it's my fault it happened. I have to deal with it, not you. I've dealt with it every day, I don't see any reason to stop now."

"You know as well as anyone that that's a flawed way of thinking, Cain! Seeing you like this hurts us too. You just...you need to know that you're not the only one who goes through this stuff. I-I mean, you need to know that you don't have to bare this weight on your shoulders all by yourself." Austin felt uneasy and struggled to pick the right words. This was a delicate situation with a surprisingly delicate psychic, if he spoke without thinking he could seriously offend Cain. Dexter remained silent, staring intently at the teen whilst seemingly deep in thought.

Cain was silent as well, though only for a moment. "No. Austin, you don't understand, and that...isn't your fault. I haven't told anyone about it, ever. I haven't even told my parents that I still think about it all the time. You know how I sometimes come down to your room, blanket and all and ask to stay the night? It's because sometimes, being alone with my thoughts just becomes too much to handle. Just being near you two and knowing that, yeah, I'm not truly alone...It makes me forget for just a little while. That same energy of yours that terrified me and made me lose my lunch has become so comforting that I can't bare the thought of being without it. And yet, even with all that said..."

Cain turns his head back towards the setting sun, the sky slowly shifting to shades of pink as nightfall arrives.

"I can't bring myself to tell you."

Both Austin and Dexter are both left in shock. They felt like they were so close to a breakthrough, and now he's just refused to confide in them? It took the two this long to finally realize just how serious and close to Cain's heart this was. This wasn't just an inferiority complex, or a fear of letting them down.

"...You can tell now, can't you? Just how personal this is?" Once again, he pauses to scold himself. This sounded so cliché, so cheesy, so self-absorbed. Yet, he couldn't stop. These really were his true feelings. Whether it be because of some serious undiagnosed mental issue or just because he was so susceptible to emotions, for better or for worse, this is how he felt, and he really did wish he could feel any other way. "I'm so sorry, you two...Please don't take it the wrong way, I just, It's...I really want to tell you, I really do, but I just can't handle it. I can't."

A tear dripped down his cheek and splashed onto the railing. He wasn't crying about whatever was troubling him, nor were they self-pity tears. He so desperately wanted to be different. He didn't want to feel this way anymore. He wished he could force himself to open up, to not care anymore, but all of those years suppressing everything simply damaged him emotionally.

"I can't. I can't, I can't, I can't..."

The empath let his head hang in shame while his tears flowed freely. Why couldn't he be different? Why did this still hurt him so much? Why couldn't he let Him go? Why...

"Shh, shh..." Two pairs of arms gently wrap around him, slowly lulling all of those thoughts away. Without even realizing, Cain was lifted off of his feet by Dexter and brought close to his chest, a solemn expression on his face whilst Austin walked alongside, comforting the crying boy with reassurances and a gentle hand running through his hair. "It's okay, It's okay...We get it, we're here for you." They carefully brought him back down into the dorm building, shielding him from any glances from the other students still mingling about. They'd seen Cain have a breakdown of sorts before, but he was always angry at those times, not so sad he couldn't walk on his own. They were worried, but Dexter's serious presence prevented them from getting closer.  His loud cries slowly turned to quiet sobbing as they ushered him into their dorm room, gently setting him on the bed and wrapping him in blanket after blanket. Comfort overwhelmed him til' he was left exhausted. Cain slowly drifted off into sleep, Dexter and Austin staying awake and sitting by his side, holding his hands.

"We're here for you, Cain. When you're finally ready to talk, we'll still be here."

He didn't feel alone anymore.