Yan Ning couldn’t see. The world around him was colourful blotches, like seen through a lense with wrong prescriptions.

The air was reeking, the thick smoke spreading everywhere, but Yan Ning didn’t notice any of it. He was cowering on the floor, scratching his fingernails over the wooden boards mindlessly.

His ears were filled with the crackling of fire. Far away screams. Sirens outside, somewhere. The building groaning and creaking, wood giving in. 

He couldn’t hear his own thoughts over the noise that kept crashing over him like waves trying to drown him.

Every time he tried to form a coherent thought it got messed up by the noise. He hit his fist against the floor in a childish tantrum, the wood breaking under the impact. Splinters got stuck in his skin, breaking it open and bleeding slightly.

A feral growl was escaping his bloodied lips.

Somewhere deep inside him, he knew he was getting stuck in the zone. He’d be driven insane by fury, unable to break free from the violent impact of his senses taking in much more than a human could withstand.

At twentyfour, Yan Ning was a young sentinel. Too young for most missions and far too impulsive.

He didn’t know his limits.

The facility hadn’t wanted to send him out, but sentinels were scarce and everyone in the building was an important figure - a meeting of the rich powerful, going up in literal flames.

He had gone.

He wasn’t supposed to do more than support the firefighters with his superior sentence and strength, but Yan Ning had always been impulsive.

Some, or maybe most, would call it arrogance. Yan Ning never could sit still - he wouldn’t reject a challenge.

Even one he had made up himself.

And so he spread his senses, listening for screaming or voices inside the building. For breathing. For anything.

He shouldn’t have.

Yan Ning had trained keeping his sight under control, but hearing was a different beast. Misjudging his limits, he ended up going too far.

Cars. TVs. Music. Talking. Trains Water Steps Crying Laughing InstrumentsConstructionMachinery-

Yan Ning was losing his breath. Farther and farther he listened, sucked in by the vortex of sounds. He’d follow one to the other, expanding and expanding and expanding, far too much, way way way too far-

“Uhhh…ah…”

A choked sound broke out through his throat as his vision blotted out more.

This was probably how he would die.

Stuck in a sound-scape, lost in the entirety of the world’s noises.

What a terrible way to go.

There was too much going on, so Yan Ning did not notice the single sound group that was coming closer.

Breathing and footsteps, a heartbeat, blood rushing, clothes rustling.

The person stepped closer, kneeling down in front of the pained sentinel. Their long cloak and hood covered their skin, shielding it from burns.

The person - a man - gently picked up the sentinel and cradled him in his arms.

Around them, the room was burning. 

One room further in was a fresh corpse, dead only for a short while, their burning skin reeking. Yan Ning had not managed to get over there before he collapsed.

Under a simple, silver mask, the man sighed.

He brushed the sentinel’s hair out of his face and looked at the unresponsive pair of dark eyes.

“It’s alright”, he said in a raspy but oddly soothing voice. “It’s alright. I’m here.”

Yan Ning twitched.

The voice was cutting through the wall of noises like a sharp sword, opening up a gap.

“You’re not alone. You’ve got someone to return to.”

It cut away the sounds, bit by bit. The outermost areas, the ones that were reaching too far, fell first.

“I’ll always be with you.”

Bit by bit, it cut away the excess.

First, Yan Ning remembered how to breathe.

He focused only on that soothing voice, trying to find out where it was coming from. Above him? Close.

“Even if I’m not around, you won’t be lost. There’s always me to come back to.”

Warm.

The heat of the fire was noticeable first, only after that the feeling of someone holding him. Gently caressing his cheek. The voice was very quiet, only a whisper, so it was spoken right in front of his face.

“Yan Ning.”

Coloured blotches. A vague silhouette of something that could be a person.

Yan Ning’s fingers twitched.

He did not know where he found the strength, but he grabbed the other person’s wrist.

Mine.

“No.”

The voice spoke gently but without room for discussion. It wrenched itself out of Yan Ning’s grip.

“Never yours.”

Yet, the figure leaned forward. There was a soft sensation on the area between Yan Ning’s eyes. He closed them, his still raised hand freezing.

He did not try to hold onto the other again.

“I won’t leave you behind, Yan Ning.”

The sentinel did not open his eyes again. He kept them closed, his fingers continuously twitching as if wanting to hold onto something.

His consciousness slipped slowly as the sounds died down to a normal level.

Yan Ning inhaled deeply, and when he exhaled, he was gone.

Safe.

 

***

 

“I’ve told you before not to do it!”

The doctor snapped at the troop’s leader as if the man wasn’t a good two heads taller than him.

Yan Ning woke up to the familiar sight of the feral doctor tapping his finger against his leader’s chest, looking all too ready to bite someone.

“I don’t care how much you need him, Luo Fan! It’s downright murder to send him out without a guide!”

Luo Fan did not resist the treatment. Despite being a bear of a man, he spoke softly. “It’s not like we can just find him one.”

“Exactly!” Bai Xiaoli continued to scream. “So don’t let him go out! Just because he survived the last times doesn’t mean it will work again!”

Yan Ning closed his eyes again.

There weren’t many sentinels around. It was a rare condition, but it was too useful to pass up on. There were too many things you could do with enhanced senses.

Sentinels worked mostly for the police, but there was a good chunk that had their eyes on all kinds of emergency rescues, just like Yan Ning did. Because he was able to locate survivors much easier than anyone else, he was always a welcome helper whenever catastrophes of any kind happened.

Such as a huge building burning down after a gas explosion.

At the same time, he knew that every mission was especially dangerous for him.

Sentinels were prone to insanity. They could get stuck in their enhanced senses, forever lost in them, or be taken over by the fury that accompanied the loss of control.

Everyone knew that sentinels were naturally quick to snap, but Yan Ning had had a bad temper even before he developed into a sentinel. He had always gotten into fights because he was bad at controlling his moods and the overloads made everything so much worse.

If he didn’t slip into the zone completely, he’d be overwhelmed by the fury of a sensory overload.

That’s what guides were there for.

They were an anchor - keeping you rooted in reality, pulling you back when you went too far.

Those precious, precious guides. A single damned person in this whole world who could help you stay calm. How did you expect to find them? It wasn’t like you’d recognize your guide until they actively pulled you back.

Yan Ning clenched his fist under the bedsheets.

He didn’t have a guide, officially.

But he knew.

That there was someone.

That someone did help him, not only the last times, but the times before that too.

And he had asked himself so, so often.

Why?

Why aren’t you staying with me?

How dare you leave my side?

And the anger would bubble up again, a murderous impulse to destroy whoever was trying to escape his grasp. He wasn’t allowed to, but he did. How dare he?

Yan Ning gritted his teeth.

For a guide, meeting your sentinel meant riches and power. Guides were treated like treasures by everyone and would never lack anything. One word, and they’d get it. It sounded so nice to an outsider, to someone who didn’t know better.

But Yan Ning knew.

The facility’s owner had had a sister who was a guide.

She had been a lively person, very independent.

And when she did not meekly obey her sentinel, when she decided she still wanted to live her life, the man had snapped and killed her for the offense.

It was because Yan Ning knew all too well - a guide was a sentinel’s greatest treasure, but it was a treasure that was only worth its weight when it belonged to you. The moment it showed any signs of leaving, the sentinel would prefer destroying that treasure instead of sharing it in any way.

…That’s why he knew.

Never mine.

His guide, who was good-natured enough to come to his help whenever he needed it, would never be his. He’d never be able to keep him.

That was why he hid away, only appearing at the last moments and making sure no one ever saw him. He wouldn’t allow Yan Ning a single hint about his identity. There was no way to trace him and find his whereabouts.

Yan Ning was angry, but he also wasn’t.

His guide could have very well decided to just discard him completely, but instead he always helped.

“Sir.”

Seeing Yan Ning wake up, the troop leader and doctor hurried over to the sick bed.

Yan Ning looked at them, tiredly blinking and forcing half a smile.

Hide away from me, so that I’ll never think that I might be able to own you.