Night has settled over Christmas Eve like the snow blanket covering the streets of London. Scotch was Harry Hart's only companion tonight. He had left Kingsman earlier in the day, handing off the reigns to Merlin, who had been keeper of HQ for the last six Christmases on record and didn't mind adding seven.
The television was playing in the living room; the sound of some news broadcaster rattling on about a situation Harry knew was well in hand by Percival overseas. It was nice to have the house sounds like other souls were there with him, especially when normally it sat so empty.
You could have had plenty of souls here, his brain helpfully supplied, but Harry ruthlessly swallowed his scotch and shut that voice down.
He wandered the house, drinking and catching glances of the snowy evening that looked so peaceful out the windows. Just as midnight began to creep in close, Harry dropped to a chair, body heavy with too much Scotch and not enough food. Sleep started to wind its way around his body and drag him down.
His eyelids grew heavy, like weights had been added to them when he hadn't noticed. The clock on the mantle rang out with the striking of midnight, and Harry ignored the thought of where he could be with the quiet acceptance of sleep.
"And to think I gave my life for you to spend it here, a drunk, miserable bastard," a voice said.
Full alert kicked in, and Harry shot up from his seat, arm coming up to throw his glass at whoever had managed to get past his security. The last of his drink sloshed over the remains of his suit, but he didn't notice as he turned in an unsteady circle, finding naught.
"Who's there?" he questioned. "Show yourself."
"Why? So you can throw your drink at me?" The voice is painfully familiar, but Harry can't believe that he's hearing it.
"Who are you then? An assassin? Here to kill me?" Even though he was searching the room, he still couldn't pinpoint where the voice was coming from. The thought of an assassin was almost a welcomed one; death would be a familiar embrace at this point.
"My, how far have you fallen Galahad?" Harry flinches from the name, but then shakes his head.
"You've been misinformed, assassin. Not Galahad anymore," he says. He is pretty confident telling alcohol induced figments of his brain secrets wouldn't get him into too much trouble. Harry hoped at least.
"Yes, we really must discuss your choice of replacements," the voice sounds like it is drawing closer. A shadow moves across the wall, and Harry scans but finds nothing casting the image.
Suddenly, a figure steps out from the dark shadow of the room, looking every bit the same as when Harry had first recruited him.
"What part of your sanity were you missing when you recruited my son for Kingsman?" Lee Unwin said.
"You're dead," Harry replies, mostly because he likes to point out the obvious when it comes to confusing matters. A ghost most definitely counts as confusion.
"Saved your arse," the ghost quips, and walks through Harry's couch to stand in front of him.
"Your body has been buried for almost twenty years."
"Does it look I need it?" Lee asks, quirking an eyebrow that is so painstakingly like Eggsy, Harry almost forgets whom he is talking to for the moment.
"Am I dead?" Harry asks. Maybe he drank too much, Merlin had always pointed out it could one day catch up with him.
"No. Be fittin' though. Survive a shot to the head; die of the drink," Lee Unwin rattles through the bar cart, bottles vibrating on the glass top.
"Why are you here?"
"Wish I could say it is ta catch up on ol' times, but sadly that isn't the case. You've been upsetting the fates, 'arry. Frankly, I'm more pissed that you've been upsetting my son, but the fates have a more direct line and like to fuckin' moan about absolute shite!" This last bit Lee shouts at the hallway, on the opposite of the room as Harry.
Lee sighs and leans up against a wall, surprisingly not falling through.
"You made a choice tonight, 'arry. One that will have consequences down the road that are bigger than anything you are ready to handle. You need to see the whole road to understand why it happens," Lee rubs a hand over his face, looking young, almost as young as Eggsy.
"It sounds like a bad eighties movie, but I'm here to guide through three Christmases. One from the past, one from the present and one," he sighs, "And one from the not so distant future."
Harry stood there and looked down at the drink in his hand. Carefully, he set the glass down on his side table and took a stabilizing breath. He really needed to stop drinking.
"Ugh, 'arry. You think I don't know? It wasn't my idea, okay?" Lee sighs, and walks toward him.
"I think it is best I just show you," he says. Even though Harry backs up, the ghost comes straight through the chair and table, grabbing Harry's arm and ice shoots up his spine making him clench up and shut his eyes in fear. He inhales a sharp breath hoping it won't be his last.
The ice takes a minute to recede, and when it does, Harry can hear the sounds of cars and people so he instinctively opens his eyes. He finds himself standing on a set of stairs, ones he recognizes immediately.
"It isn't as nice as it used to be," Lee says, and Harry steps back to avoid touching the ghost again.
"What happened? What did you do to me?" he demands, feeling his arms to see if anything hurt.
"Focus, 'arry. This is the Christmas Past," he says, and gestures up the steps.
"I already know what happened this Christmas, Lee. I delivered the news of your death," Harry doesn't know what kind of nightmare this is, but he knows his subconscious better than anyone.
"Oh, 'arry. You have no idea." Without moving, Harry finds himself standing again in the small flat belonging to the remaining Unwins.
But it isn't as Harry remembers it. The furniture is different, the decorations are gone, all that remains is the sad tree in the corner. He barely has a chance to take it in when his attention is jerked away by the slamming of the doors.
"No! Leave 'm be!" Michelle Unwin's voice cuts through the silence of the flat, she's pulling on a man's arm. Harry almost didn't recognize him, but Dean had never really changed it seemed.
"I can't fuckin' sleep with that brat cryin' all fuckin' night!" Dean yells. Harry immediately steps forward, but gasps out in pain as Dean just walks through him. The door he had moved in front of is kicked down. Harry turns in time to see a young Eggsy trying to get off his bed, making a mad dash for the corner until Dean grabs his arm.
There isn't time to scream, but Harry finds his mouth opening to try as Dean yanks Eggsy to him, and backhands the child into the wall. Eggsy crumbles into the wall, crying out as he falls to his knees.
"You stupid boy," Dean shouts, and hits Eggsy again. Michelle tries to get between them, she pulls on Dean, begging through her own tears.
"'arry, we don't have to stay," Lee says at his side. The ghost reaches out, almost instinctively when Dean throws Michelle aside. Lee watches as she slides right through his arm, and jerks back upright. He clears his throat, biting his lip between his teeth.
"How old is he?" Harry asks.
"Eleven," Lee answers. "It will not be the last time Dean lays a hand to him or Michelle. Thankfully, you do eventually help them get free."
"That doesn't make it better," he says. Not when he should have been there. Not when Harry can see the medal around Eggsy's neck, glinting in the light from the window. It wouldn't ever make it better.
"I know, friend, I know," Lee says. He gently rests his icy hands on Harry's arm. "It is time to go now."
The icy pain shoots through him as a welcomed relief from that hell.
It takes longer for Harry to open his eyes this time. He isn't sure he wants to see what seen will greet him this time.
Taking a breath, he forces them open to take a look around.
He finds himself outside, on the side street of one he does know. Lee steps in beside him, and Harry shoots curses at the hope that the whole thing had been some scotch fueled nightmare-hallucination
"No such luck, I'm afraid," Lee says. There a sadness in his eyes that Harry hadn't noticed earlier, but now he isn't sure it hadn't always been there.
"Christmas present?" Harry questions. He doesn't know when, but he can no longer feel the hazy effects of the alcohol.
"Indeed. Come, we'll catch them at the pub," Lee leads the way this time.
"Pub?" Harry questions, but walks after the ghost.
Once again, the moment Harry takes a step forward, he finds himself standing in the middle of a pub. It's lively, cheerful even, people sharing in the joys of Christmas Eve. The crowd is mostly younger, obviously professionals by the suits. Those that didn't want to spend an evening in from of their television sipping scotch, he figured.
"What are we doing here?" Harry asks, but finds the answer laughing off to the side of the pub.
"Roxxx! You're no fun! Ya aren't playin' right!" Eggsy protests, knocking back a shot from the several on the table in front of him.
"What's my incentive?" Roxy quips back, smiling easier than Harry had seen in a while. The last few months had been hard on her and Eggsy. They were still learning the ropes and Harry had been making sure they were living up to the expectations placed on them.
"Ugh, fine," Eggsy says, and scoops up a wedge of lime, sticking it obscenely between his lips and sucking. Harry cleared his throat and shifted uncomfortably. Lee didn't seem to notice for once.
"If you must know," he continues, spitting the lime onto the table. Roxy makes a face, but she laughs all the same. "You are right. I've been crushin' hard for a long time."
"I knew it!" Roxy says triumphant. She deposits another shot in his hand and takes one up herself.
Clearly past the point of caring, Eggsy taps the shot against hers and takes the whole thing back just as Roxy smirks and says, "Here's to Harry Hart, the conqueror of Eggsy's heart!"
Eyes bulging, Eggsy chokes on the shot, coughing up alcohol while Roxy giggled hysterically next to him.
Harry, however, felt like he suddenly couldn't breathe. He turned to Lee, find the ghost just smirking as Harry tried to compose himself again.
"I don't know what she's talking about," he settles with finally.
"Don't you?" Lee retorts. He shakes his head. "Here I was thinking you looked just as red as Eggsy does."
"Roxy's just saying that to make Eggsy-" He gets cut off when Eggsy regains his ability to breathe.
"You can't say a word, Rox," he says, looking so much more serious now than before. "Promise me, Rox. Say it."
"I promise, Eggsy," Roxy says, her eyes going soft. "I just don't know why you don't just tell him."
"Like you've told Merlin?" he asks, a small smile playing on the corner of his lips.
Roxy shudders and shakes her head. She sits back, and toys with the brim of a shot glass.
"It hasn't been a good time, Eggsy," she says.
"'nd ya think it'd be with 'arry?" Eggsy retorts. He shakes his head too. "It's a nice thought, Rox, but I don't think da right time will ever come up with 'arry. I mean look," Harry startles as Eggsy gestures a hand in the direction of them. "He turn me down tonight, didn't he?"
Harry breathes a sigh of relief when it is clear that Eggsy can see him about as much as Dean could see him in the previous Christmas. Then the words catch up with him.
"Oh," he says. He remembers then. Standing in Merlin's lab, Eggsy had looked so good, tempting if Harry thought about it. Harry had always known he was attracted to the younger man, but it wasn't something he could act on. Never get close, he had sworn to himself. Never get in too deep. Eggsy had pulled Harry aside while Merlin and Roxy had been chatting.
"You wanna come with us?" Eggsy asked, smiling up at him.
"It's late, Eggsy. I believe the most appropriate place for me to go is my home." Arthur had brushed off Galahad. He wasn't in the mood to entertain. The mission had been executed sloppily and he would have to spend hours trying to make sure nothing had gotten through their careful net.
"Not even for a couple of pints?" Eggsy asked.
"I believe I said no, Galahad. Good night," Harry replied coldly. He snatched up his tablet and files and was out the door.
"Realize now, don't ya?" Lee says, smiling sadly.
"That was the choice? I chose to not go out with them on Christmas Eve and instead I get tortured for it?" Harry protests.
"But it has consequences beyond tonight, 'arry. Eggsy never gets the nerve to ask you again," Lee says, stepping closer to the two young Kingsman agents, who talk on unaware.
"A mission gets put into action tomorrow. You are practically still drunk when you reach Headquarters and they arrive for the briefing late. A quarrel breaks out among the four of you, and Eggsy buries all his feelings for you deep under the shame and disappointment you put on his shoulders," Lee reaches out to touch his son's sleeve, barely grazing it with his hand, before sighing. He turns back to Harry and steps in close.
"Over the next four years, you grow apart, 'arry. Kingsman suffers for it. They all suffer for it. And unfortunately, it never gets better," Lee shakes his head. "Oh, it gets so much worse."
Harry knows it is coming, but still can't hide the gasp of pain from the cold touch. The pain of the icy grip spreads almost like a blast-wave. He flinches away, but can't get free of the hold until suddenly he is on his knees in the snow.
Only, he isn't on the side street or the steps of the flat. He is on his knees in snow-covered grass. There isn't the bite of cold when he puts his hands down to steady himself enough to stand. He hasn't felt nauseous from the previous trips, but as he sees where he is, bile rises in the back of his throat.
The cemetery spreads out around him, rows and rows of graves and silence. Harry's eyes are drawn to the crowd gathered around fresh dirt. It is a small gathering, and dread curls tight around his stomach, squeezing as he takes a hesitant step toward them.
This time there is no quick movement to the graveside. Harry feels every step, and when he does slide in next to Merlin and look to the tombstone, a cry escapes his mouth.
Gary "Eggsy" Unwin
Son. Brother. Gentleman.
1990-2019
"No!" Harry shouts, falling to his knees. He reaches out toward the stone, but his hand passes harmlessly through.
"Yes, Harry. The mission you send him on isn't probably researched and Eggsy is too wrapped up in his own thoughts to know that the target makes him. He's killed instantly four days before Christmas by the hands of an international drug lord," Lee says, standing somehow beside him.
"No, no," Harry moans, covering his face in his hands.
"He isn't yet thirty," Lee speaks on.
A child's sob comes from the crowd and Harry looks up even though he knows whom it is. Daisy is held up by Michelle, who looks decades older than she should be. He glances around, seeing other knights, and Roxy on the other side of Merlin. They aren't standing close, and though Merlin seems to be trying to take her hand, Roxy takes a step away and crosses her arms.
"She hates him now. Roxanne blames Merlin for not being able to stand up to you. She will quit Kingsman in four months time, and move to Italy. Dies in fifteen years time while trying to stop a burglar who gets into her home in the middle of the night. Merlin never goes after her, and never forgives himself either. He'll die at the hands of a poorly chosen recruit who will kill four other recruits before Merlin stops him. He bleeds out before you can get him to Medical," Lee says.
"Why?" Harry asks. Tears are on his face, and he isn't sure he can slow them.
Ignoring the question, Lee continues on. "Without Eggsy's support, Michelle will fall back on bad habits. She'll overdose before Daisy's fourteenth birthday. Daisy is given back to Dean and…well I'm sure you can work out how that affects her future. She does get free eventually, but spends out the rest of her life alone and without all but a few social friends."
"Why do this? Why show this to me?" Harry feels like something has hollowed him out. Every piece of him seemed torn free and rearranged in a way he didn't know how to fit back in him again.
"Because you made a choice and fate needed you know that there are consequences to all choices. You'd forgotten 'arry. You let yourself slide back into Kingsman after Valentine like you would never have a choice again. He took that from you, 'arry. I know he did, but you should have taken it back." Lee knelt down next to Harry, the crowd gone, while the grave remained.
"I'm sorry, my friend, but this is where your actions lead. This is where they take you and you have set yourself down this path."
"No, no! You can't let this be it. He's your son, Lee! There has to be a way to stop this!"
There is a loud beeping from somewhere, Harry turns to find it but it seems to far off.
"I'm sorry, 'arry. Nothing can be done anymore. You made the choice," Lee says, shaking his head.
"Let me make it again! I'll change! Please, Lee! I choose Eggsy! Please!"
"I am sorry," Lee says, reaching out and grasping Harry one last time.
The cold was swift and overwhelmed him to the point that Harry wasn't sure if he wanted to come up from this dive.
But there was that beeping…and shouting?
"Harry!"
"Medical personnel are on their way," Merlin's voice cuts in.
"God what if it's a heart attack or summfin?" Eggsy's voice is near and it draws Harry out like heat source.
"'ggsy?" he questions. His head throbs, and he has to blink several times to take in the surrounding.
"Thank fuck," Eggsy swears and pulls Harry in close. "Thought I lost you, bruv. Christ."
"What-" Harry looked around, noting the look of panic on Merlin's and Roxy's faces. Eggsy seems the worst, running his hand through his hair and biting his lip in worry.
"What happened?" he asks.
"You just collapsed on me bruv," Eggsy says. "I was askin' ya…well it don't matter what I was askin' ya. You just fell out on me. Are you feeling okay? Should we test his memory? What year is it?"
"Eggsy, he appears to be fine," Merlin says. "Still I'd be happier to get him down to Medical to check everything out. I'm sure the staff won't mind staying a bit late before their holiday."
"Wait, is it still Christmas Eve?" Harry asks, sitting upright fully. The others shoot him a look but nod.
"It hasn't happened yet then," he mutters, mostly to himself.
"Okay, Harry, maybe you should tell us what year it is," Merlin states, about to lean back down, when he nearly gets knocked over as Harry yanks Eggsy in close and smashes their faces together.
"Oh," Roxy squeaks, and stands to back away a bit. Merlin follows her as Harry seems to devour Eggsy.
When the pair breaks apart for air, Harry is smiling for the first time Merlin has seen in a long time.
"I choose you, Eggsy. I'll always choose you," he says. "I'm sorry I wasn't there, but I will be now. I promise."
"Oh-okay," Eggsy nods, a blush crossing his cheeks. "I suppose you will be okay going to the pub then with me and Rox, yeah?"
Harry turns to the others and shakes his head. "Oh for god's sake, Merlin. Kiss the woman already!"
Sputtering, Merlin turned a funny shade of red before Roxy smiled broadly and pulled him into a filthy kiss. She pinned him to his desk in a move that Harry wasn't sure they taught in Kingsman.
"So what did happen to ya?" Eggsy asks, half sitting on Harry's lap, half on the floor.
"I'm not sure I know. Seems like a second chance to make the right choice," Harry said, smiling and leaning in to kiss him again. He sent up a silent thanks to his old friend, promising this time would be different.