So, I naturally thought of this fic while actually listening to the song, but I also had ideas from other songs by the same band. I have no plans to make songfics out of any of them, so please don't ask, but now I can't even listen to 'Don't Wake Me', 'Monster', and 'Lucy' without thinking of Micchy. Or Linkin Park's 'Burning in the Skies', for that matter.

DISCLAIMER: I don't own Kamen Rider Gaim or any of its characters. I also don't own 'The Last Night' by Skillet

EDIT 02/26/2016: It has been brought to my attention that including the lyrics to the song, even with a disclaimer, goes against the copyright policies of this site. Given this site's history of just deleting stories without even attempting to communicate a warning to the author, I have decided to err on the side of caution and remove the lyrics while leaving my original content intact. The full version is available on my archiveofourown account (same username) since that site actually has the courtesy to actually ASK the author to remove such content first, and until they see fit to ask me, it's staying put.

WORD COUNT: 2416

"We are each our own devil, and we make this world our own hell." – Oscar Wilde

Friday, September 26th, 2014 – Early Morning

Knocking on the door in the middle of the night was never a good sign, in Takatora's opinion. It was bad enough that he was rousted out of bed at an hour when any sane person should be asleep, but he was usually greeted by some sort of bad news when he answered. It gave him the temptation to roll over and ignore the person bothering him until they went away, but unfortunately, he'd long since gotten too old to get away with such a childish reaction.

So when his slumber was disturbed at half past two in the morning by the hesitant sound of knuckles meeting wood, Takatora reluctantly dragged himself out of bed and stumbled to the door. He winced as his sore muscles protested; spending over four months in a coma was not easy on the body, even though he'd woken up several weeks ago.

Mitsuzane was on the other side, arms wrapped himself and eyes fixed on the floor. His pajamas, which had already been a bit big on him when their mother had first sent them to him two Christmases ago, now hung very loosely around his frame, demonstrating how much weight he'd lost in the past few months. Takatora had been having problems with getting his little brother to eat a healthy amount of food, and private discussion with various members of the house staff revealed that they'd also been experiencing difficulties with keeping him properly fed during Takatora's coma. He'd already been on the skinny side to begin with. Between that and the obvious lack of sleep due to his recurring nightmares, Mitsuzane's health was on a slow decline.

His mental health was in no better state. Takatora knew his little brother had been severely damaged by the events of the past year. Between the self-appointed pressures of trying to save his friends from certain death, the utter catastrophes that had resulted from his seriously flawed methods of doing so, and the way he'd been manipulated and played with like a toy by not one, but three psychopaths, it was no surprise that Mitsuzane had been horribly broken, both mentally and emotionally.

Sometimes, Takatora would catch him staring at his left wrist, where a thin, jagged, white scar marred the otherwise unblemished skin. It had healed remarkably well; according to Zack, who'd witnessed its infliction, and the doctors who'd treated it, the cut had been fairly shallow, and one who didn't know it was there might not notice it unless it was shoved in their face.

"Nii-san…" Mitsuzane whispered, looking like he was deeply regretting waking his brother up. Like he was considering bolting. Takatora carefully stepped closer, not wanting to spook him. Mitsuzane had become extremely anxious around everyone. Like he was expecting a severe beating for his sins with every sudden movement.

"Is there something you needed, Mitsuzane?" he asked softly.

"I- I… I just…" Takatora let him take his time. With anyone else, he might have told them to hurry up and spit it out already, but that tactic was highly inadvisable considering how skittish Mitsuzane was right now. "I just… I wanted to say that I'm sorry. For… well, everything."

This only increased Takatora's concern. Mitsuzane had continued to apologise, over and over, long after Takatora (and a few others) had first insisted that half the things he was apologising for weren't his fault, and that they'd already forgiven him for the other half. But he'd never gotten up in the middle of the night to spontaneously deliver the apology. "Mitsuzane, are you feeling alright?"

"I-I'm fine," Mitsuzane whispered, but didn't even make a decent attempt to look like he believed his own words, "I just needed you to know that."

"Are you certain that that's all?" There was something very wrong going on here, worse than it had been these past few months, and that was saying something. Mitsuzane nodded timidly, and started to hesitantly pull away from the doorway, like he was just as unsure about leaving as he'd been about staying before he'd spoken. Then Takatora noticed a spot of red poking out from under his sleeve. "What is that?" His little brother froze at his words. Takatora slowly reached out and gently grasped his wrist; Mitsuzane flinched, but not violently enough to discourage him. The elder brother pulled the sleeve back, revealing the long, shallow scratches along his far-too-thin arms. "You've been hurting yourself again."

A gut-wrenching mix of horror, disappointment, and helplessness flooded Takatora. He'd caught Mitsuzane at it before, methodically clawing at his skin with his own fingernails until he drew blood, because no one left him alone with anything else to use. He only did that to himself when his emotional roller coaster was at its lowest point, his depression at its deepest. When he was thinking about taking it farther.

Ignoring his own rule against uninvited contact, Takatora pulled his brother into a tight hug. Mitsuzane initially fought it, but it wasn't long before Takatora felt the dampness on his shirt as the sobs began. He gently pulled Mitsuzane into the room, shutting the door behind them and leading him over to the bed. Memories came back, old ones of when the younger boy would run to him after having a nightmare, curling up in his bed and falling back to sleep easily because he knew his big brother would protect him from the monsters.

But how to do that when the only 'monster' Mitsuzane now feared was Mitsuzane himself?

Unsure of what else to do, Takatora just held Mitsuzane closely, having no intentions of letting the teen out of his sight until he'd chased those thoughts away again.

"Why?" Mitsuzane whispered between gasps, an indeterminable amount of time later, "Why do you still want me around? Everything I've done has made life worse for everyone. You'd all be better off if I was dead. Why?"

Takatora immediately reacted to that, cupping his hand under his brother's chin and turning his head upwards. "You made mistakes. Big ones, yes, but you're not the only one. We all have regrets about actions we took when everything happened. And don't you dare think that no one will miss you. Zack, Ōren, and Jōnouchi have all been asking me how you're doing, just to name a few, and God help me, I cannot lose you again, Mitsuzane!" He sighed heavily. "Half the decisions you made were the results of my own failings, because you couldn't depend on and trust me, and you knew that better than I did. I should have been there for you when you needed help, instead of leaving you to take care of all your problems by yourself. You're my family, for God's sake."

Mitsuzane stilled at his words. For a second, something akin to hope flickered in his eyes. "Nii-san…"

"I'm so sorry for everything I did, and for everything I didn't do. I don't know how I'm ever going to make it up to you, but that doesn't mean I'm not going to try. I'm here for you, Mitsuzane, no matter what."

The two of them sat in relative silence for a while. Mitsuzane made no effort to remove himself from his brother's embrace, something that Takatora decided, after a bit of internal debate, to consider progress. It had been painful to see his little brother refusing, fearing his touch. Instead, Mitsuzane just rested his damp cheek on Takatora's shoulder, sniffling every once in a while as tears continued to fall.

"It wasn't just you," the younger brother suddenly whispered.

"What?"

"When you said you failed to look out for me, even though we're family. You weren't the only one."

It was true. Their parents had been away so often that Takatora had practically had to raise Mitsuzane all by himself. Even after their father's death (something that had honestly hurt more because of his killer's identity than the murder itself), their mother had only been in Japan once since. Takatora had still been in his coma – in fact, the people caring for him hadn't even identified him yet, so Mitsuzane had still been of the belief that he'd actually managed to kill his own brother. So he hadn't been there to witness the incident that was her visit to Mitsuzane's hospital room, but he'd heard the story, alright.

The woman that dared call herself a mother had had the nerve to matter-of-factly tell her distraught, guilt-ridden, traumatised sixteen-year-old that that with his father and brother dead, he was now the heir to the family's company (this was before Yggdrasil had been officially dismantled), and that he should start acting like it. Her reaction to his earlier suicide attempt had been primarily focused on the scandal that could result if the news got out. She hadn't gently asked what had driven him to do it, but had repeatedly exclaimed: "How could you do this to your own family?!" And she hadn't been talking about the grief they would suffer from his death, but about the embarrassment. As if that was the real priority, and his own pain inconsequential.

Thankfully, though Takatora had been unable to protect Mitsuzane from her at the time, Kazuraba Akira had taken care of it. Her empathy for the boy who'd tried to kill her own brother had been astounding. It was clear that she'd been a big influence on said brother's own brand of compassion. She'd overheard the entire tirade, and had proceeded to take the elder, upper-class woman to task for how she was treating her own son. Kureshima Rei had reportedly thrown a barely-dignified fit and demanded that Akira be thrown out, but two nurses who'd witnessed the whole fiasco had ensured that the security personnel knew which woman had been causing their patient distress.

"She was wrong, you know," Takatora quietly insisted, "She was too concerned with the company falling apart to notice how badly you were hurting. A mother shouldn't do that. I'm so sorry I wasn't there to defend you."

Mitsuzane sighed. "I'm the reason why you weren't there; don't apologise for that one."

It was, sadly, impossible to refute that logic.

"Still, our mother should not have treated you like you were just going through some teenage rebel phase and making things difficult for her for the hell of it. You were dealing with enough as it was." Of course, the phrase 'dealing with' wasn't entirely accurate, because it suggested that he was working his way through the guilt, and in the past two months, he didn't appear to be making much progress with that.

Silence reigned again. It had been years since there'd been such close physical contact between them, especially for so long. Once again, Takatora was reminded of when they were younger. Before he graduated high school, before he'd gone to work at Yggdrasil immediately after returning from college. Back when things seemed simpler. It had been just the two of them, then. They could shut the door and exist in their own little world where appearances and expectations were meaningless. Back then, Mitsuzane would confide in him about anything: the social politics of private grade school, the fact that he didn't have any real friends, or the pressure of living up to the image their parents needed him to portray.

Life had been so much easier back then. There were no alien invasions to stop, no impending human extinction, no convoluted webs of lies and manipulations (or at least not on such a large scale). He could just wrap his baby brother in his arms and promise that he'd always be there for him, and that it would get better. Those assurances felt like lies, now. Because it hadn't gotten better at all.

Eventually, Mitsuzane's shaking ceased completely, and Takatora glanced down to see his eyes drifting shut as he slipped into a fitful slumber in his arms. The elder brother didn't dare budge an inch, lest he waken him, not even to move them to a more comfortable position. He remained sitting with his back against the headboard. Screw whatever pains he'd be feeling in the morning; this was worth it.

Hours passed, but Takatora couldn't fall back to sleep. He never could when something was really troubling him. He just sat there, thinking. He'd failed his brother so badly. Maybe if he'd been there to support him, Mitsuzane would have turned to him for help in protecting his friends, instead of going behind his back with his own plans. Maybe he would have been able to guide him away from Sid and Redyue and Ryōma before they could have influenced him.

Truth be told, he wasn't certain what he could've done to help, but the fact remained that he'd been completely unaware that Mitsuzane had needed it. Ever since he'd started working on Project Ark, he'd become oblivious to his brother's needs.

No more. He'd do whatever it took to help Mitsuzane hang on and get back on his feet. To help him transform into someone he could be proud to be. Kazuraba Kōta had brought him out of his coma for that reason, after all.

Mitsuzane stirred in his sleep, one hand closing in a loose fist with the fabric of Takatora's shirt clenched inside. The elder brother couldn't lose him. He needed the youth to see that, to understand that killing himself would never undo his wrongs, but would only hurt those he left behind even further. This was his penance for his own sins.

What it all boiled down to was that the two of them needed each other, now more than ever. And Takatora didn't intend to let his little brother down ever again.

THE END

Two things:

One: I don't know what, exactly, Takatora could have done if he'd been more attentive to Micchy, but the point is that he feels like he should have done something differently. This is his feelings of failure showing through here. However, I can't completely blame him for anything other than being entirely too trusting of the wrong people. Think about it: he's operating with the weight of humanity's future on his shoulders, in spite of the fact that there are probably three other Yggdrasil branches (run by the Englishman, the French-speaking guy, and the guy I'm presuming is speaking Chinese seen in Ep 32) also working towards the same goal. He's also mentioned in Ep 36 that he's practically raised Micchy by himself. Even teenagers know that raising a teenager is no walk in the park, and Micchy getting involved in the Helheim situation doesn't make it any easier. So with two very difficult responsibilities on his shoulders, it's no wonder he spread himself too thin and screwed them both up. It's just too much for one person. I kind of hate their parent s for putting all that pressure on him and barely appearing to help. My portrayal of their mother in this fic, and others I plan to write, is heavily influenced by this, and I'm not ashamed to admit it. Their distant relationship with their father is particularly evident in the Zangetsu Gaim Gaiden, when they don't even seem all that upset about his death, at least not as much as you'd expect from someone who's just lost a parent.

Two: I think Akira got too little credit. I think she's a brave woman, and Takatora was right when he said that she did an excellent job raising her own little brother to become such a good guy. I wasn't all that surprised to see him confiding in her in the finale. To be honest, I thought of shipping those two early on in the series run, before the characters even met. Their one scene together, to me, looks like it could eventually become something more.

Now, 'The Infiltration' is a much longer multi-chap fic that will take a while to finish, but here's a small preview:

"Let me get this straight: there's a whole other world of wizards and witches living among us. The British community is descending into civil war. The Japanese one pulled this Section Zero into the mess. They pulled you into it. And now you want to pull us into it. You want us to go undercover as students in a magic school, even though we can't do magic ourselves, in order to protect them. Is that about right?"

"Yep," Haruto answered easily, taking a bite out of his donut.

So basically, Micchy, Zack, Jōnouchi, and Mayu/Kamen Rider Mage (Jōnouchi somehow has his Driver back) infiltrate Hogwarts during the events of 'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows' to protect them from the Death Eaters within, join the DA, and hopefully save a few lives in the process.