Sage stomped along, snorting in response to Jackson's comment. "Do you," he sort of huffed. Sure, it was a little bit doubtful...he knew Jackson hadn't grown up with everything he'd ever wanted, but that didn't mean he understood completely what he was talking about. How could he? How could anyone? War was soemthing way different than anything he'd been through, that was for sure.

He noticed the other male looking around worridly, and he frowned, peerign around at the forest. What was he so worried about? They were going east, it was fine. They'd just go west on the way back and rejoion the group at some point. He wasn't too worried about it.

(all good)

Sage sort of huffed out a breath of air through his nose in response to Jackson's comments. He wasn't trying to mess with their new relationship...he really wasn't. He was just still rather upset with himself, and the rest of the group, and his shitty situations.

"I know, I just...never mind," he eventually sighed, not wanting to get into an argument. Anything he said right then would wind up just sounding rude, he figured.

"I don't want to argue," he murmured sheepishly, hoping that didn't just sound....snotty. But he was frustrated with life at the moment, and while it wasn't jackson's fault he'd snapped at him a little bit.

(short I gotta run)

Sorry double post-

(all good lol)

Sage heard Jackson comment but his mind was circling around too quickly for him to really listen to what the other boy was saying. He sort of just stomped along angrily for a while, trying to keep his emotions under control enough he didn't completely fuck this up. He didn't want to do that....he wished things could just go back to what they were before. Before everything got so ...messed up. He just wanted to be a kid again. No worries, no hurt. Nothing bad except for a bruised knee or two from playing too hard.

Soon enough though, when he noticed Jackson running to catch up, he sort of remembered what he'd said. "you know..." He heasitated, biting his lower lip before huffing out a breath that sort of just meant 'screw it'. "No sort of true pain is any worse than others," he noted. "if I've learned anything it's that," he added with a shrug, trying not to just sound angry. He was trying to tell Jackson he could talk to him about something if it was bothering him. He of all people would understand whatever terrible things he decided he'd been through. He'd probably been through it himself.

Sage felt an eyebrow creeping upwards as Jackson denied that anything happened. He didn't really believe him, but he also didn't want to push him. Instead, he sighed and looked over at the other boy, chewing on his lip ring thoughtfully. "look, I know what it's like to hide something," he noted after a moment, offering Jackson a smile. "And I feel as though double denying something makes it somewhat obvious something happened," he noted with a slight twinge of amusement, reaching to toss him a bit of gauze and decent sized sticky bandage for his arm. At least he'd had the sense to bring some supplies. "You don't need stitches do you," he added, making other conversation so it didn't completely target the other guy. "I don't have anesthesia if you do," he added. Really, they didn't have that in the army half the time either, but whatever. He didn't need to know that, that wasn't really the point.

Then he had an idea. "what if we both share something," he suggested. "You say something, I say something, and we never tell anyone," he added. He may as well throw it out there ...if he was asking Jackson to talk he may as well show the same amount of balls, even if he really, really didn't want to.