Title: If You Die

POV: Niko

Author: Obi the Kid

Rating: PG

Summary: Niko has to deal with one of those life altering questions from his eleven-year-old brother. Takes place a short while after the events in the flashback portion of Slashback.

Disclaimer: All hail Rob Thurman! No profit here, I'm just having fun.

**Minor spoilers for Slashback.

I was sleeping. Or trying to. Sophia's drunken rants in the other room were quite elevated this evening. Since I'd broken her arm a month ago, she'd given me space, but her leverage over Cal hadn't lessened. We were both still hostage by her title as 'mother' until I hit eighteen and got the hell out of Dodge, taking my brother with me. And that meant suffering her continued late night alcoholic, psychotic, insufferable binges. I'd lost count of how many empty bottles had crashed against her bedroom wall in the last few hours. Her 'John' of the evening having spent two of those hours in a screaming match with her until she chased him out, hurling some of those empty bottles in his direction. One good arm or not, the woman could hurl glass with the best of them. Cal and I were well clear of her bedroom. The one room shack we were holed up in since the Junior debacle didn't hold much space, but the tiny living area was a hallway away from the only bedroom. Our sleeping bags were set in a way in which we'd have easy access to the front door if it were necessary to make a hurried exit from the house.

As usual, when Sophia was fuming in a nighttime rage, Cal would stuff his face into comic books. I would use the time to study and read everything from psychology to history. After three hours though, my eyes had grown tired and my body craved the sleep that shadowed over me.

In the end – to be fair - it was more eye-resting than sleep, but some nights, I'd take what I could get. Cal, only inches away, was stomach-down on top of his sleeping bag with a flashlight propped under his chin.

It's how I'd left him when I'd felt myself slipping away, but it's not how he was when I came back to complete awareness. By then, the comic was folded and put aside and the flashlight had settled on the carpet. Cal was lightly tapping my chest with a finger as he whispered my name.

"Nik, wake up."

The tone wasn't urgent, so I didn't bolt upright; I did however focus on his shadow-lit form until my eyes had the outline of his face in sight. He flipped the flashlight towards us and I saw that older-then-his-years face looking back at me.

"What's wrong, Cal?"

"I need to talk to you. It's important."

"You have school tomorrow. You should be sleeping, no matter the distraction." A glance toward the bedroom. "Lie down."

"But, Nik, I need to talk to you."

"I understand that, but I don't need you to be a target for flying whiskey bottles if she wanders out here. If you recall, being the highest object in the room is a bad thing. Lie down."

He did finally, facing me and mimicking my position of being on my side with one hand slid under the pillow and the other remaining free. Less than a foot separated us.

"Okay, now what's that important that it can't wait? It's almost one thirty."

"You are. I need to ask you something and promise you won't get mad."

I rarely 'got mad' with my brother. Impatient? Yes. Frustrated? Yes. Annoyed? Absolutely. But anger was an emotion that the both of us worked hard to curtail, at least when it came to each other. Nevertheless, I assured him anyway.

"I promise. Talk, Cal."

"What happens…if you die?"

Now there was an odd and off the wall question, but this was my brother after all. In his eleven years, I'd learned to expect anything to come out of that mouth, so the question didn't throw me off, although silently, I did admit to be a bit confused.

"What do you mean, Cal, if I die?"

"You can't die, Nik. You can't. Not unless…You just can't. Okay?"

"We all die, little brother. At some point, it'll happen. I don't plan on it happening any time soon though."

"But it almost did. And I don't know what happens if you die."

"I'm not going to die right now, Cal."

"You could be hit by a car tomorrow."

"Certainly possible, but I can control that for the most part."

"You could get shot by a jealous boyfriend."

"I'm not dating anyone."

"You could get eaten by a mountain lion."

"We're living in the inner-city gutter. Not too many mountain lions in the slums of Ohio."

"A dog then."

"Cal."

"You could get tortured by a serial killer living next door."

I swallowed ten emotions at once (all bad) before I said, "We don't talk about that."

"Nik, it could happen. Tomorrow. In a week. A month. And I…I need…if it does…if you die…I…I want to die with you."

And there it was.

Cal's biggest fear wasn't his monster half. It wasn't Sophia. It wasn't what other people thought of him or how they treated him. His biggest fear was losing his brother. Losing me. I'd always known that, it was my biggest fear as well, but this was the first time Cal had ever admitted it openly.

Tragically, I'd given this a lot of thought in recent years. So much so that I'd actually reasoned about how to take Cal with me if death was imminent. It was foolish, I know, and unlikely, but it was a sign of how terrified I was at Cal being left without the only person in the world who cared about him.

Another part of me though wanted to tell Cal how he should move on and live his life without me. Try hard. Work hard. Do his best. That was the normal human reaction, but ours wasn't a normal human life, was it? For us, there was no life without the other. And that was the tragic, yet simple and true fact.

I didn't give him the 'go on without me' speech. Instead, I reached over and cupped a hand behind his neck, drawing us closer together, temples touching.

"I will do everything in my power to never ever die on you, Cal. I swear it. But if it does happen, you have to be prepared. You have to know how…" I stopped and closed my eyes, sucking in a long, deep breath. This was it. A moment I'd been dreading. I was actually going to tell my little brother the most efficient way to end his own life. Who thinks those things? Who does that? It's certainly not what big brothers do. It's not what any guardian does. Not a sane one anyway. But here I was, with no other option. Our reality was the option. And no matter that it went against almost every fiber in me, Cal and I would have this discussion and a physical lesson to follow.

I didn't release him from my grasp as I said, "There are ways faster than others, Cal. You know how to use your knife. I can show you the exact areas to target. There are a couple of ways to go quickly." Damn me that I knew that type of information and was actually willing to share it with my eleven-year-old brother. "Drugs can the job as well, although we don't have access to anything that strong. Guns are the easiest way, but we can't risk having a gun in the house with Sophia and that always open possibility that Social Services might come calling one day. You can jump from a bridge or building, but it's not always a guarantee." My heart hurt as I continued down this path and blinked away the moisture in my eyes…or tried to…as I moved my head to rest my chin on the top of Cal's. "For the tools we have right now, the knife is the best way. I'll teach you. This weekend, after my job at the dojo, you and I will go to that park a couple blocks away." Calling it a park was being generous; it was more like a patch of grass and a line of shrubs, but the shrubs offered privacy from peering eyes from nearby houses. We could practice there. I would teach him everything I'd read and learned about in regards to bringing a swift death to one's own self.

"Okay, Cal?" I eventually finished, still not moving from the protective hold on my brother.

"Nik?"

"Yes?"

"You don't have to show me if you can't do it. It's okay if you can't."

Blinking didn't help the moisture this time and I gently kissed the top of Cal's head. He was no fool, knowing how painful it would be for me to show him how to commit suicide upon his big brother's death. So he allowed me an out. I didn't accept.

"If you have to know…if it has to be shown, I will be the one to do it, little brother. But I swear to you it won't be anything you'll ever have to do, at least not for a very very long time. Got it?"

The dark head nodded under my chin. "Got it."

I eased my grip on him, but he didn't move. "How about you sleep now," a crash from the other room failed to faze us this time around. "Can't be late to school in the morning."

Tension in his neck lessened and his serious tone lightened. "This school isn't so bad. I haven't had to growl at anyone yet and Miss Rollins thinks that 'I'm as cute as a bug in a rug'. She also things I'm kinda normal."

I snorted. "Clearly she doesn't know you like I do. However, I'm sure that'll change soon enough, once your lovable true self shines through."

"You love me, so that must make me lovable, right?"

Unsuccessfully, I attempted to hold back a laugh. "I do, and not really." That was Cal. One minute more serious than someone three times his age could ever hope to be, and the next, forcing me to take desperate measures to not snort up a laugh at his come-by-it naturally sarcasm.

Another something crashed into something else in the bedroom. A few more shouts, several foul words shouted out the door in our direction, then things finally went quiet. Nice timing. "Looks like the background music has ended, time for bed. For real this time." I pulled my face away from his and he immediately curled into himself. It wouldn't last, he'd end up sprawled over and under and through by morning…but as long as he slept.

Slipping my left hand back under the pillow, I made sure my knife was still within reach and in correct position, not only for simple access, but to make sure we didn't accidently stab ourselves tossing and turning in the night. This was our ritual. Always before bed, no matter what time that ended up being. Cal did the same with his. This weekend, he'd learn many more ways to use that knife…to end a life, but safety would always come first in our training, even if the life he might take was his own.

This was our life. Our reality.

As long as I didn't die, it would continue to be.

How screwed up were we?

"Good night, Cal."

"Night, Nik. Don't die, okay?"

"Promise. Stop talking now. One more word and…"

"I know, I know. No TV for a week. It's the worst torture a kid can have."

"Cal."

"Okay, I'm shutting up."

"Then stop talking."

"You stop talking first and then I'll stop talking to your talking."

"Cal!"

"I told you I was lovable."

I sighed myself to sleep after that. Assuming I didn't die an early death, life with Cal was going to be one challenge after another. Tomorrow, I'd start studying about meditation. With this little brother at my side, I do believe I was going to need all the patience and mental release I could find.

The End