Disclaimer: Saint Seiya (c) Kurumada and probably a bunch of other companies whose names I don't know. No material profits being made here.
A/N: Only a not-so-short ficlet. Enjoy! ;)

Eyes on me

It was Camus's first week without his master by his side, and he was doing his utmost not to throw out the window all of the old man's lessons on keeping his cool. There were eyes drilling into the back of his neck - really bothersome eyes that made him extra aware of every single individual move made by every single individual muscle in his body.

He had been feeling the foreign gaze on him since he had stepped foot in Sanctuary - he was returning to the craggy, sun-bleached hills for the first time after years of training in Siberia - and he was finding that his newly-donned Aquarius Gold Cloth, so legendary for its resilience and protective power, was somehow immune to this subtle attack on his person. Still, he would rather be caught dead than to turn around and give whoever it was that was watching him the satisfaction of knowing he was bothered.

The feeling eased as Camus approached the twelve Temples of the Zodiac and he breathed easier with every step he took up the endless staircase that would take him to see the Pope to report his arrival as the new Aquarius Saint. By Aries, he felt his muscles begin to unwind and by Taurus he was feeling more like himself. Crossing the cold aura enveloping Gemini brought back memories of the snow and ice storms from the Siberian lands that had become his second home. As he walked through Cancer, he could almost hear his soft-spoken master's voice instructing him on how to let go of his emotions and become a great Saint. He was feeling more like the cool-headed Saint his master had carved him into by Leo and less like he would crumble into failure at the first sign of adversity in Virgo. Confidence flooded him in Libra, and in Scorpio...

"Camus!"

Something bright and yellow and very noisy barrelled into him. From the colour and the awful gong-like sound that his Cloth made on contact with the stranger, he deduced he was suffering a hug from one of the other Gold Saints, one who had long blond hair.

He wondered how he should go about extricating himself from the situation. "Leave me alone" sounded too rude to say, although it did convey the urgent need coursing through Camus to put some distance between them. "Who are you?" was also a good question and "why the hell are you physically attaching yourself to me?" an even better one. In the end, he went with the ever-eloquent:

"Ahem."

And hoped the stranger would get the hint.

"I missed you sooo much!"

Apparently not.

It was at this point that Camus realised that the other man's Cloth - could he be the Scorpio Saint?, it would make sense - had some extremely pointy extremities and that he had better be careful not to have an eye accidentally gouged out. He had not exactly made enemies during his past stay in Sanctuary at age nine, but he distinctly remembered that there were a lot of trainees who did not like him because of his aloofness. This guy did not seem to be one of them, but he thought best to play it safe.

"Ahem," he repeated.

With a final squeeze that brought the jutting spike on Scorpio's shoulder piece dangerously close to Camus's face, he was finally released and given enough room to see more from the stranger than his hair.

He was met with a pair of clear blue eyes, shining with some sort of emotion that Camus could not understand. They were somehow familiar, teasing at old memories, but he was sure he had never seen the face they were set on.

"I thought it was you!" the stranger blabbed on, impervious to the cold stare Camus was bestowing on him. "I wasn't sure when I saw you walk into Sanctuary, but then I thought 'crazy red hair, Gold Cloth, it's gotta be him!'" He laughed, but Camus failed to see how or why his looks were such a joke.

"Excuse me?" he put on his coldest tone, the same one that had once led a fellow Saint apprentice to such rage that they had ended up wrestling out their differences on the sands of the arena. His master had not particularly enjoyed that stunt and it was probably part of why the man had later decided to finish Camus's training somewhere other than Sanctuary.

"Huh?" the blond asked, quietening down and taking a step closer as if worried. "What is it?"

Camus immediately took a step back, fearing that he might be pounced on a second time. He was disturbed by how casually the other was addressing him. Yes, the two of them shared the rank of Gold Saint, which meant neither one was of a station above the other, but - damn it (even in his mind, he whispered the curse, denying the frustrated sentiment that was forbidden to the Saints of ice) - the man did not know him, they had never met.

"Excuse me, but I should be going," Camus said as politely as possible. "Perhaps we can continue this at a later time." Hopefully never, he added in his head.

He was back to feeling uncomfortable in his own skin, self-conscious of the weight of each piece of his Cloth and the exact amount of effort it would take him to move and get away from the awkward situation, and he loathed the feeling. Only one person had ever managed to make him feel that way before, that same trainee he had traded punches with, and he had made sure since to keep his distance from any others who might make him feel that way. He had not distanced himself from that trainee, though, as relations between them had taken quite the turn in the following weeks.

"Come on, you don't have to be that way," Scorpio was saying.

"I apologise," Camus cut in before the other's manners drove him further away from his usually cool mindset, "but I really must report to the Pope."

"Ah, he won't mind if we catch up a bit first! So, how were the penguins?"

"Penguins?" That caught him off-guard. He was sure he had heard a question very similar to that before, but he had no idea where. "There are no penguins in Siberia."

"Psh, I know, I know... I remember it from the first time you told me, thank you very much," the blond replied, shaking his head. "You used to be able to get it when I made a joke."

Hearing the Scorpio's whine convinced Camus: he was missing something from this picture. He was certain he had never met the Scorpio Saint before, but the man sure seemed to know him. Either they did know each other, or Camus was being mistaken for someone else, which seemed unlikely as he was the only apprentice he knew of who had spent time in Siberia recently. The key to this, he decided, was in the talk about the penguins. That had sounded familiar to him and he didremember saying something to that effect at some point - if only he could place it. He strained his memory, and came up with the vague impression of a late autumn day... sitting on some rocks, where no one would see him... tending to someone else's bloody fists...

"Why do you always do this?" Camus had asked the person whose knuckles he was disinfecting. In his adult mind, he could not see the other kid's face, only feel the texture of his hands, rough where there were calluses, but soft everywhere else.

"Because I can't just let them bad-mouth you, Camus! You're my friend." He remembered the flush that had struck his cheeks then, could still feel it as if it had happened on this day... and dearly hoped it was not happening again in real life as he relived it in his mind.

"It doesn't matter what they say. It doesn't bother me," had been Camus's honest answer.

"Don't care. It's the principle of the thing." The other kid had been very stubborn, he remembered that now, especially when the subject was Camus. After the first time the two had exchanged blows, the unknown boy had come to sorely regret having ever made fun of the little Aquarius trainee and for some reason made it his personal mission to ensure, by force if necessary, that no one else made the same mistake ever since. Camus, who had never had any real friends, felt it was his obligation to at least stick by the kid as his name was defended so fiercely.

He was a blond, the thought suddenly hit him. It did not help Camus identify the mystery person in his memories, though. Half the people on Sanctuary had blond or blondish hair from being out in the sun all day, every day.

"You can't just let them talk that way about you! You're better than any of them andyou'll be a Gold Saint someday. You have a reputation to uphold! Besides, you're my friend. I don't like it when they're mean to you..."

The other boy had pulled his hands away from Camus's grasp and placed them on top of his shoulders, bringing them closer together.

"Camus? I know you're leaving soon and we probably won't ever see each other again, but... promise me something?" They had been only kids, but, as Camus lifted his head to look at the blond in the eye, he had felt something stir so deeply inside him that he had known he could only say he would do whatever the other - his friend - asked. "Promise me you'll look after yourself? Promise me you'll be okay in Siberia?"

And his memory suddenly cleared when he thought of the answer he had given. He had said "of course" and then leaned in close to the other to seal the promise with a brush of his lips. He also remembered the bright blue eyes that had watched him do it, stunned at first, then happy, then hidden from view as their owner closed his eyes to return the gesture.

And the bit about the penguins? That part of the conversation had come a few hours later as the blond realised how late in the day it was and how upset his master would be that he had disappeared without a trace. He had been tying the forgotten bandages around his hands in a rush when he threw the warning that Camus should watch out that the penguins did not eat him while he was not there to protect him.

"Milo!" Camus said, loudly, back in the real world, at the Scorpio Temple, face to face with the same eyes - and the same person - from back then.

"Yeah?" the Scorpio Saint asked, surprised by the sudden outburst, not knowing what was behind it.

"It's..." Camus stopped before he could say "it's you". He was not very experienced in interpersonal relations, but some primitive instinct let him know that that would not be a smart thing to say after the other had given him such a warm welcome. Unfortunately, he did not have such a strict control over his body language as he did over his mouth, because Milo raised an eyebrow and looked at him with suspicion.

"What? What was it you were about to say?"

Camus smiled. Only one person had ever managed to make him feel uncomfortable in his own skin and that was the same person he could never keep his cool around. His master's teachings simply did not apply when it came to Milo.

"It's good to see you."

This time, he was the one who initiated the hug and even though his temperament would not allow him to hold the proximity for more than a few seconds, it was enough to make him feel as giddy as he had back when he had been a child and first discovered that he really enjoyed Milo's company.

"Heeey..." Milo said as he looked at him appraisingly once more. "Had you forgotten who I was?"