There was no hope for him anymore. No chance of redemption, not even an inkling of hope in his life. As he felt time slowing down around him, he vanished from his opponent to break the fight. He found himself outside, the warmth of the sun against his face. There he sunk to his knees and fell back against the knee-high crumbled wall of the destroyed building. There he waited for his intimate doom to find him.

And find him he did. There he stood, staring down upon his bleeding form crumbled so pathetically against the wall. There he stood, the man whose life he ruined in a contract. There he stood, bearing a mask that had become a symbol of death to some.

There he stood, seeming to wait for him.

Was he honestly expecting him to get up at this point?

With a groan, Daud rose to his feet and took his sword in his bloodied hand... his own blood. He had been trying to hold the wound shut, as if he could repair it with magic. Then, as soon as he did, Corvo rushed to him, and smacked the blade out from his grip. Distantly, he heard it clank off objects on its descent, but that was a background noise to him now. Daud turned around to look up at his will-be killer, with acceptance and dignity keeping his face straight and his voice steady. "I have one more surprise for you. I ask for my life."

When he expected to be simply killed off regardless, he found himself surprised to see that Corvo was watching him - almost like a raven waiting for roadkill to die before he could pluck out the entrails.

Daud took a breath and returned his hand to his bleeding side. "When I killed your Empress and took her daughter, something broke inside me. Now, I see the design on the back of your hand, the mark of the Outsider himself, and I remember all I've done. The years of waiting for the right moment to step forward from an alley and drive a knife between the ribs of some noble. All the money exchanging hands, from one rich bastard or another. Killing for one of them one year, then being paid to kill him in return the next. But what have I accomplished? More than you have, or much less? I remember bending at the shrines, listening as the Outsider whispered that I was going to change things, that I was somehow important. It felt good, made me believe I was powerful. Now I want nothing but to leave this city. And fade from the memory of those who reside here. I've had enough killing. The men you worked for asked you to kill for them, but you found some other way. You took a path I could have followed, but did not."

A silence that lasted only a second passed, but it seemed like an hour. Then Corvo reached down for him, and Daud only weakly held his hand up in defense. A tight grip came around his throat, and that hand he raised went straight to Corvo's bare hand to offer some restraint against it. It didn't even seem like an effort was made when he was lifted up until his feet couldn't so much as scrape the ground, and the chilling ghost of a blade found itself against the delicate skin beneath his jaw.

"My life is in your hands." He concluded, staring him right in the dark goggles of that horrible mask. "Make your choice."

That mask covered many things, Daud knew. Whatever face Corvo was making right now was a mystery. But what it failed to hide was the heated anger in his every breath, the way his hands were almost trembling. It was clear he wanted nothing more than to see his blood fly off this building in the most magnificent arc no one else would ever see, but there was also a reluctance. As if despite all of it. Despite the men he killed before all of this, despite the fates he left his targets doomed to, and despite his thirst for revenge that only the arc of blood he wanted could quench, his hand stayed where it was. He did not draw the sword back, nor did he slice it through his skin.

As Daud was held there, he kept his stare on the mask lenses. And soon, he started to see through the dark glass and could just barely see the shape of Corvo's eyes. His brows were pulled down in an angry way, but the hateful shape they made didn't match the torn feeling behind them. As it became easier to see through the darkness, he could see the tears that were welling up where most men couldn't see. Those tears were a secret, as if he never expected anyone to ever know of them or the pain that was so obviously there.

That's when he understood what it was. The clash of emotions that were at play. He was Serkonan born, raised to appeal to honor. And honor to them was different than honor to those of Gristol. Honor here was upholding a position. Honor in Serkonos was something of a different definition - honor was to avenge family and close friends. He killed his Empress and kidnapped Emily, here that would be like dishonoring his position, but to Corvo - to any Serkonan - it put his honor in question until he returned the favor. Hell, maybe Corvo appealed to both definitions.

But if it were just his murder of the Empress in question, then honor alone would have been every excuse to cut him down. He wouldn't have hesitated. There was more to it than that. Perhaps Corvo saw that living with the mistakes was more punishment than anything else, that one should suffer. But again, that would make his choice obvious and he wouldn't be hesitant.

What was it? Daud couldn't think of another reason - but something else was there.

His sword started to quiver, and quickly, Corvo withdrew it and turned away, releasing his throat walk a few paces distance. Strange... he didn't leave right away either. He seemed to linger, as if he weren't entirely sure himself whether or not to turn around and plunge a knife right in his windpipe.

Daud sighed though. "And you choose mercy. Extraordinary."

Corvo's shoulders twitched only slightly, but it wasn't lost on Daud. "I better not see you again." Before he could test his patience and mercy, Daud vanished away, and patched his wounds. He would find himself a job on a ship if he could. Billie had given him plenty of ideas. Still, his thoughts remained on one little fact.

Corvo spared him... for some reason, he spared him. But he seemed so reluctant to do so.

Daud didn't understand why until months after the fact, when he received a letter - the first he had in that time - from, to his surprise, Corvo.

And there he sat on his bunk, after breaking the red wax seal, reading that letter with a burning curiosity. He could almost hear Corvo's voice in the words.

"Daud,

After all that happened, all the misery you caused, I was sure that I meant it when I said that I better not see you again. I surprise myself right now by even writing this at all, more so that I can keep a steady hand in the process. Believe me, I broke my quill on the first draft.
Try not to confuse this as a sign of forgiveness, because I am far from that. But now I have had the time to meditate on my thoughts and reasoning that day you dared to throw your life to my hands. Why I decided to spare you was more unconscious if anything, I could not understand it at the time. It felt like no matter how much I tried to force myself, my hand would not let me end you.
Now, I understand why. Despite the pain you caused me, and despite how much bitter anger you gave me then, it just did not hold against your words. I would never admit it then, but my resolve crumbled when I realized how honest you were. You managed to torture yourself over your own crimes more than I ever could, but I could have still killed you then still with the satisfaction of knowing that you at least regretted what you did. No, it was because I bothered to consider your regrets, and that forced me to consider what my Empress would have thought. She was always just and forgiving, and killing you in her name after hearing that? What kind of disgusting monster would I be then?
More still, I considered Emily as well. I wanted nothing more than to see her become a wise and just woman, like her mother, and I was and still am a role model to her. What kind of example would I set by mercilessly gutting you like I wanted? Even if she never heard of it, I realized that I could never live with myself knowing that while she learned to spare those who wish to oppose her and find another way, I could not find it in myself to do the same.
Perhaps your words were all I needed to hear then to shake some sense back into me. I fear what I could have become otherwise. So in a sense, this is a thank you.

Corvo."

That's what made the tears in his eyes make sense, the hesitance. Daud could understand it now. Whether or not Corvo was lying didn't matter, because it was enough to provide him with the closure he needed to get past it. He could rest a little easier knowing why he was spared.

He could live on.

So this is assuming two things. Corvo and Daud both had Low Chaos approaches to the event in the game, and Corvo had the same train of thought I had when given the choice to kill Daud or not.

Regardless, this is just something I wrote because the situation struck me as an interesting one, and I wondered how much this would eat at Daud after. Even if I didn't elaborate on that so much, I still liked the opportunity to write this and work out the situation in my mind.

Hope you enjoyed.