It had been an accident.
All of it, really, had been an accident.
But this?
He never wanted this to happen.
The fight had started as all of their fights normally did; Murdoc was pissy, drunk, and tired, and 2D just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Normally the singer escaped with a few bruises and maybe a black eye. Murdoc left with a little more blackness in his heart, but it was easily buried by whiskey and women.
He couldn't bury this.
It was the day of his father's birthday. He was more agitated than usual. Nobody else was home.
He had settled on drinking half his life away on the couch, but 2D had different plans. He was tired of seeing the bassist waste his life, tired of watching him slowly kill himself like he had nothing to live for, like nobody cared about him. He tried to take the bottle. He should've stopped there.
The drunk barked, something rough and annoyed. Reached for the bottle. Missed. Barked again. He was wasterd and sick of his singer's shit. He stood up and demanded his bottle, demanded to be left the bloody hell alone. He didn't intimidate the singer, all wobbly and angry and several inches shorter than him. The bottle wasn't returned.
"Muds, I'm worried about you." He had said, something too warm for Murdoc's liking, something way too personal, stirring behind his bloody eyes. The eyes he ruined.
"I'm fuckin' fine, Faceache!" He had snapped back. Reached again. Stumbled. Stuart caught him. Held his arms and pushed him back to his feet. The bottle rolled across the floor. He always caught him. Murdoc slapped him, then.
"Don't bloody touch me."
There was an apology, of course, fast and panicked, spit out like hot coals. The usual. Habit, really. A bandage used to sooth a raging man and get him back in his chair with his booze.
It didn't work as planned.
When Murdoc looked down to the leaking whiskey on the carpet, he delivered another swift smack to the taller male. Punishment for wasting his expensive liquor. The room echoed with the sound.
"Muds, please…" He whimpered, wiping his now damp eyes. There was already red on his cheek, but he still stood straight.
"Please, what?" His words were snarled as he turned on the singer. That was the first moment the bluenette felt real fear. "Please what, Dents? Fucking WHAT?"
"...Please..Stop…" He knew now what was meant. Stop hurting me. Stop hurting yourself. Stop. You can stop. He didn't stop.
The next handful of minutes moved at varying speeds.
For one, it was a whirlwind of anger, screaming, fists hitting flesh and blood staining clothes as he beat his best mate to the ground. "You fuckin' mistake! You were a bloody accident! A pretty boy, is all you'll ever be! Ya can't fuckin' fix me! Stop trying! I never shoulda taken care of ya! You've been nothing but a pain in my bloody arse since the beginning! I wish I never bloody hit ya!"
It only lasted seconds.
For the other it was pain, blinding pain, in his heart and his body. Through his own tears he saw a broken man, one he couldn't help, one he couldn't love. He took the pain, he supposed, because it was the only way he could be there for his bassist. He knew, somewhere, it would be worth it.
When the storm had passed, they were on the floor. Murdoc was atop 2D, body pinning him to the ground by his waist. Underneath him, a mangled mess of blue hair and bruises, blood, and black eyes still watching him.
His world fell apart.
That was the first time in countless years he had cried. All of it, his hurt, his hate, ripped him apart as he stared at the devastation he had wrought. At the mess he made. At the idiot under him who still smiled at him, whose eyes still stared at him like he wasn't a demon in the presence of an angel.
He couldn't breathe through his tears, through his sobs, but he managed to beg forgiveness. He took all his words back, unable to look away, convinced he would drown in those black eyes. "Stu.. Oh fuck, Stu… i didn't.. I didn't want this.. I'm so sorry… I never wanted to hurt you… Oh fuck, Stuart, i'm sorry."
In the blackness, in the spiraling smoke and ruins threatening to swallow him whole and spit him out, he felt a touch. A palm, on his cheek, wiping the tear from below his eye like he had seen in those sappy romance movies many times before. It was a warm hand, a warm touch, one filled with the kind of light and love he had never felt before. The broken boy under him spoke. He heard every ounce of pain and misery he had inflicted for all those years of torture, speak the words that might honestly have saved his life.
"M-Murdoc…"
A smile like heaven itself opening.
"I forgive you."
His body couldn't hold himself up any longer. He fell, his arms shook and gave out and he fell endless miles into the bluenette's chest, endless miles into the forgiveness he never could give himself or allow himself to have. The forgiveness...The love… he never thought he deserved.
His fingers clawed themselves bloody on the carpet and he sobbed and pleaded and died and was re-born, right there on that living-room floor, covered in the blood and tears of the closest thing he had to God.
From the darkest, deepest part of him the words spilled, shredding him from the inside out. He couldn't stop them, he didn't want to, and as he felt arms wrap around him he didn't know if they ever would. There would never be enough. Oh God, Stu, I'm the mistake. I regret it all, everything I've done to you guys. To you. I don't know anything else. You've never hated me. I've always hated you. How is that? How can I hate somebody like you? Fuck, Stuart, you're a fucking angel. You blessed me. How could I hate an angel?"
The singer said nothing. He ran his fingers through his hair and held him, waiting and patient as always. Minutes ticked by; tears gradually subsided. Murdoc couldn't give any more. They soaked through 2D's already bloody shirt and both the singer was sure he felt them sink into his heart.
His next words soaked into every corner and crack of the room, floating above and around them and filling their lungs like smoke.
"I love you, Stuart."
A confession of sin.
"I love you too."
Absolution.