The state of Ishimaru's ongoing emotional turmoil caught up with him once more. He remembered that heartbroken face again and felt like such an asshole about how it was his damn fault he had to go through that. And if it had been four months or whatever, imagine how he lived with the shock and horror of it weighing down on him. He didn't really want to. Mondo wasn't an expert on psychological assessments, but he had to guess that after something that disturbing, there was no way he didn't come out of it scarred. In a way, he could relate.

He removed a hand from his head and felt around in the dark for Ishimaru, got him around the shoulders, and pulled him down snug next to him. "You know, I haven't been so good at keeping promises. But this seems like a good place to start."