Hello! I'm pretty late with it, but University's taking me so much tiiiiiiime, and... I've only JUST finished watching season 2.

I don't even know where to start: it was insane! I have so many feelings and thoughts that I have a desperate need for the writers to hurry up: I NEED SEASON 3 SO BADLY! Lol

I've come up with a few ideas while I waited for the train and wrote them down during the ride. They're all taken from bits of Mumford sons's songs (whom I LOVE, btw).

This is the first one (they all revolve around the aftermath of Mike's passing -supposed passing, hopefully-) and it's from Briggs POV. I also have some drafts of those in Briggs/Charlie's POV, DJ's POV and Johnny's POV. They're just drafts, but I'll write them down as soon as I'm done with my exams. But most importantly, I have Paige's POV all written down and I'm really excited to publish that specific one! I haven't decided yet whether to publish it as last or I don't know.

Well, I hope you like this one and let me know what you think! Feel free to DM/Review your questions if you have any. (I apologize for any bad mistake, I'm Italian, so please, don't be too harsh!)

#SAVEMIKEWARREN

- xoxo Mel

The boxer & the fighter

The vase was simple, smooth. Sharp at the top, but rounded at the edges: just like he had become.

To Briggs, that had been the easiest choice to make out of all the ones he had had to face in just one week. Sometimes, it just bothered him to be in charge at Graceland, but right now, he hated it. If it weren't for Charlie (who had wisely told him not to choose black, but a greying deep blue colour: "sophisticated just like him", she had said), he would have retrieved to his secret apartment and spent the whole week there. Alone.

But he couldn't. He had to take his responsibilities, the ones that came with the job. And the house. And the family.

He breathed deeply, fidgeting with his eyeglasses before taking them off and stepping up on the rock.

Charlie looked up at him, her eyes all puffy and red despite her great make up skills; Johnny took his hands out of his pockets and mimicked her, staring into Paul's stone cold eyes. It was hard to believe that he, dressed all black and neat, was the same funny, inappropriately ironic, Peter-Pan-syndrome suffering dude that he had always been.

Jakes stood a few feet back, looking the same as always: his dreads messily pulled back, hands in pockets, his t-shirt and jeans thrown on as if he had been sleeping under a bridge for a week. He had always been the man who spoke his mind whenever and however he wanted, but Briggs knew deep down that even if he would never admit it, even if he had always shown an inherent dislike for the kid, Briggs knew that beyond those sunglasses he would have seen sad eyes. The ones he had only ever seen on DJ's face when his kid was taken away from him.

The truth that lay beyond his last thought shadowed his features: DJ was going to go through that shitty phase where the absence of a lost child was unbearable all over again. But this time he was not alone. He would share it with his roommates.

They had all lost their kid. They had lost Mike.

With one last glance at the people in front of him, Briggs reached into his pocket and took a piece of paper out. He cleared his throat and straightened his back, ready to make the hardest speech he had ever had to make. He hated speeches: he'd much rather have everything done and over with instead of losing himself in a bunch of words, most likely looked up on google. But no.

"Mike deserves better: I have to do this for Mikey", he had told Charlie the night before when she had come down to check on him at 4AM. And he had meant it.

"So..." Silence.

He mentally damned himself, 'A perfect start indeed'.

"I... I'm not used to this and I'm sure nobody is, so bear with my incompetence." He didn't dare to look up at the others and rushed to open the crumpled paper in his hand. Scanning the inked words, he wetted his tongue and read out.

"Mike was a really good guy. He was a tireless, unceasing, overachieving, far-reaching, strong young man. His praiseworthy intelligence and shocking integrity and entirety made him one of the best and most hard working men I've ever had the pleasure to work with."

He stopped to take a moment and let all those words sink in, just like he had seen it done in the movies. For the sake of dramatic situations, he had figured.

Although, he bit the side of his cheek.

'Mikey deserves this, Briggs. C'mon', he told himself.

He took another breath and pursued his lips, spotting the painful look in Charlie's eyes as she thought about the effort he was putting into this. 'For Levi'.

He went to speak again but he only gaped a few times, before shutting his mouth completely. He looked up, realizing everybody was now clearly staring at him in confusion. 'This ain't right', he concluded, crumpling the sheet in his fist and throwing it on the ground with a bitter chuckle.

"I'm sorry but this is plain stupid", he blurted out, putting his hands on his hips.

'Don't' Charlie mouthed, but he ignored it.

"Briggs..." Jakes called out and started walking closer. But he held his hand out, motioning him to stop where he was.

"No, DJ, this is a huge pile of bullshit!", he raised his voice a bit. All the stress, the mourning, the anger and the frustration he had collected inside of him after Mike's passing came rushing back all at once.

"This is not what Mike would have wanted and this is not what I'm going to do! C'mon, he was an ass!"

"During his last days at Graceland he did nothing", he paused, fixing his eyes on each member of the Graceland family for a moment; a resigned Charlie, a sorrowful looking Dale and lastly, a stone-cold faced Johnny. None of them tried to stop Briggs again.

"Nothing but show us how delusional we were and we took it, all of it! And we all know why: because he was Mikey! We loved him the way he was, even if that pissed us off 90% of the time, 24/7!

And I'm pretty sure it's safe to say you all wanted to strangle him once or twice just like I wanted to every time I saw him all bright and shiny and ready to go at sunrise", he murmured the last part, but everybody caught that.

Especially Charlie, who let out a soft chuckle, remembering how loud he was when he had got there and had decided to make fun of her by screaming 'Good morning, sunshine!' right into her pounding head. She had hated that irradiating smile he had thrown her at the time; now, she would have done everything in her power to see it flashing back at her just one more time. As soon as that memory disappeared, it left a sour taste into her soul.

"We took all of it because he was the good one among us. He always made the right move, he always took the right choice. And we knew that, even if he'd scream at us, even if he were to push us off the balcony... we knew that he would be down there in a minute, ready to catch us. And..."

Words died in his throat, as his mouth went dry. Realisation hit him like a bus: Mike was gone, and he was never coming back. He wasn't going to be there to save him from a crazy Jangles or a suspicious Badillo anymore.

For a moment, for the first time in his life, Paul Briggs felt absolute emptiness.

It was just a brief second. He felt like in limbo. Numb, empty.

He shook his head and turned his back to the others, touching the vase and caressing the sharp top.

'How', he asked himself, 'how is it possible to feel like this?'

He had met many agents in his life and lost just as many, but this was the first time he had actually felt empty. Not even when his roommates were murdered. When Lisa was murdered.

He knew why, though. The connection with the kid was incredible: he saw his old self in Mike and he had high hopes for him. Mike was his only shot a redemption and with him gone, he wasn't sure he was going to make it as a good father.

'Don't worry, Briggs. I'll be your kid's father, you can simply be the cool dad', Paul remembered the joke he had made the night before they left for Mexico, when they had confessed their worries and plans for the future. Before Doomsday came.

He looked up at the sky. The sun was setting slowly and he thought about how many times he had watched Mike sit on the beach outside the house, reflecting on whatever was going on in his mind, at the end of the day.

"He was the best part of us and he died in the only way he could have died, like a hero."

He slowly lifted the top and opened the vase.

He let the ashes fall down the rocks slowly: the wind took each grain with it, just like Sid had taken each beat of Mike's heart away from them. Slowly, painfully, but at the same time fast and harshly, making the pain last forever.

"In the clearing stands a boxer and a fighter by his trade and he carries the reminder of every glove that laid him down. And cut him 'till he cried out his anger and his shame. The boxer's leaving now. You're leaving, Mike. But the fighter still remains"

Briggs had meant those words: Mike was dead, gone with the wind now, but his spirit would always be alive inside of him. 'Cause it wasn't over.

That glove. Closed around his oxygen tube and letting the darkness engulf him until life was sucked away from his pale body. The memory of his once bright blue eyes wide opened and clouded with death was still fresh in his mind: he could remember every detail, every single shade of emotion he had felt once Mike's lifeless body had been revealed behind the door. It still seemed so unreal to say out loud 'Michael Warren is dead'. The sound made everybody, including DJ, sick to their stomach.

Well, everyone but Paige, obviously.

Briggs had studied her for the past few weeks and she didn't show any sign of remorse for what she did. He couldn't believe that she, out of everyone, had been able to betray Mikey so easily and throw him the mouth of the wolf, as a succulent prey.

But Paul knew, he was sure that Mike hadn't been as easy to kill: he had fought it, he had fought the glove as hard as he had been able to, until Death decided to screw him over. He knew that Mikey gave it a hard time.

His head was still grasping the sheets tight, the blood was still dry on his knuckles.

They should have been around his neck, squeezing, just like he had confessed to Briggs a few days before.

That glove, Sid's glove, had to be discarded and destroyed. And he was going to do it. For himself. For Charlie. For Dale and Johnny, but most of all, for Mikey. 'Cause the fighter still remains.

"Tora, tora, tora, Mikey", he whispered, loud enough just for the two of them to hear. He and the kid. Paul and Mike, the fighter and the boxer.

The boxer had left, but the fighter still remained.