Missing Piece
Braig did not return after the final battle, and he's not going to.
Ienzo misses him.
They're settling.
It's strange to think how quickly they're adapting to a post-Xehanort world, but experience has shown them the heart is far more resilient than their research had long led them to believe.
They're still all together. Ienzo was sure at least someone would try to strike out on their own after everything, but perhaps they've all grown too comfortable with each other to even consider a life apart now, and he's fine with it. They're a family after all. His family.
Ansem the Wise at the head. He's not quite the king again yet, but he knows how to take charge and quickly catch up on years of absence. Even continues their research. The Replica Project finally completed, he shifts focus to the datascape, looking to see what light lives in an artificial world. Aeleus and Dilan patrol the city, surveying conditions, and working alongside the Restoration Committee (which now doubles as a provisional government). Ienzo pitches in where he can.
The wise sage and his apprentices working for the betterment of Radiant Garden. It's almost normal again.
Almost, because there's still one apprentice missing. Braig never reappeared after the final battle. And he's not going to reappear. Ienzo listens to Lea's report several times with a heavy heart, and by the end he's sure of it. And once Lea leaves, Braig turns into a ghost.
The others don't mention him. If a conversation risks turning to him, it comes to a cold stop and takes a detour instead. The others don't hear his laidback laugh, or his callous comments, or his acerbic "As if" in the background.
But Ienzo does. He hears it with increasingly painful clarity when they're all together, and sometimes finds himself looking over to a corner of the room where he feels Braig should be. He's pieced enough together to be mostly sure that Braig isn't dead, despite Lea reporting (secondhand) that he jumped off a cliff, but if he's not dead, then where is he? Why hasn't he come back to them?
Why is Ienzo the only one who cares?
He decides to ask Even. He was the last out of them to see their missing friend, but Even pretends not to hear him. Ienzo knows he's pretending because he's studying a report at the time, and his eyes move across the page slower. Ienzo gets a loud exasperated groan after the third time he points it out.
"Enough, child," Even snaps. "You can ask me as many times as you like, but the answer isn't going to change. I don't know."
"But you were there," Ienzo presses. "Surely, you must have spoken to him?"
"Yes, Ienzo. While I was infiltrating the Organization, trying very hard to carry out my own plans without getting caught, I chatted extensively with Xehanort's second-in-command about the good old days and how we should return to them." Even's sarcasm cuts deep. "All I know is he was looking for some box, and didn't care about anything or anyone else. What you're wanting is impossible. Drop it."
But Ienzo can't drop it. Master Ansem notices and takes him aside to try and talk about it. But Ienzo finds himself feeling like a child again and can only quietly assure his mentor that everything is okay. He doesn't want to bother him with this. Master Ansem wouldn't really understand anyway. It may have been their fault, but he wasn't there with them.
Aeleus was though, and he listens. Or rather he tries, but when Ienzo mentions wanting to find Braig, he averts his gaze and Ienzo stops talking. He knows they've broached a forbidden topic, and he doesn't want to push further. It's enough to know Aeleus doesn't care to think about Braig either.
Dilan just gives him a strange look and a scathing "Good riddance", and Ienzo finds himself storming out of the castle's secret passage into the waterways. Braig showed it to him once. He'd often used it to sneak out or into of the castle, usually after a night out. Ienzo walks around a little until he reaches a series of stairs, and then sits down on the on the bottom step and watches the entrance, as if he expects Braig to suddenly sneak back into their lives any moment.
It's not Braig, but Dilan who eventually appears, holding a brown paper bag in his hand.
"Somehow I knew I'd find you here," he says flippantly. "Still sulking?"
Ienzo is not sulking. "Did Aeleus put you up to this?"
Dilan just rolls his eyes, and sits down beside him. "Why must you always think that Aeleus must be behind it? I'm perfectly capable of realizing I'm a jerk without his help."
It earns a small smile from Ienzo at least, but the smile fades when Dilan says, "You wanted to chat, so let's chat. About Braig."
"It's fine. I get it."
"No, you don't. And that bastard doesn't deserve your grief."
"It's not grief," Ienzo says, because he's still not quite sure what this is.
"It's not? He suddenly disappeared from your life. You never got to properly say goodbye. Your world is finally getting back to normal, minus one obnoxious, traitorous piece of filth—
"I don't need a psych analysis," Ienzo snaps.
"What you need is closure," Dilan tells him seriously, and holds up the paper bag. "This will help."
The bag contains a bottle of mezcal and a short stack of plastic cups. Dilan takes one and sets it beside him. Another goes a little ways in front of him on the landing. The third, he hands to Ienzo.
"Me too?" Ienzo asks in surprise.
"Why not? You're old enough," he replies. Ienzo realizes he's right, and awkwardly accepts the cup, holding it still as Dilan pours the cold clear liquid into it.
His first drink. Master Ansem had let him sip of a couple of dessert wines when he was a child, but he's not sure it counts, and Zexion never took interest in alcohol. A weird sense of excitement grips him.
Dilan pours a shot for himself, and then leans over and fills the last cup. Unlike the first two, this one he fills to the brim.
"For Braig," he tells a confused Ienzo, and lightly knocks his own cup against it. The plastic cups don't make a sound, but the sentiment is there. Dilan then downs his shot in a single gulp. He makes a face, but the pursed expression is quickly replaced with a grin.
"Good stuff."
Ienzo nods and looks down at his own cup. It doesn't smell particularly good, but alcohol never does. With a focused stare, Ienzo taps Braig's cup as well, and following Dilan's example, kicks back the shot in one motion…
And immediately regrets it, as the foul smelling liquid turns out to be foul tasting as well, and burns his throat as he chokes on it, leaving behind a bitter sting in his mouth.
He feels Dilan whack him on the back a couple of times as he coughs, and finally sputters out a desperate, "Water?" to which Dilan just shakes his head with an eye roll.
"Stop being so dramatic. It's not poison."
"It's gross!" Ienzo protests when his body finally stops shuddering long enough. "Did Braig like this?"
"No, I do." Dilan replies. "Why would I bring something he liked?"
"How can you even drink it?"
Dilan shrugs. "You'll learn." He pours another shot for himself, and despite Ienzo's attempt to move his cup out of reach, one for him as well.
"Take it slower," Dilan tells him. "Try savoring it a little."
"You said this would help," Ienzo reminds him accusingly. "How, exactly?"
"I'm not doing this sober. Alternatively, drink and forget."
"I don't want to forget!"
"That cup there," Dilan ignores him and gestures to the lonely cup on the landing. "I'm pouring one out for him."
"Dilan! He's not dead!" Ienzo yells.
"What difference does it make now? Either way, he's not coming back. Our little group's just going to have to deal with it."
"Except no one is dealing with it," Ienzo says, the previous fire in his words burning out. "You're all just acting like he never existed."
"We cope in our own ways."
"But I don't understand why I'm the only one who cares that he's missing," Ienzo argues. "He's one of us."
Dilan doesn't reply at first. Then in a steely voice he asks, "What about Xehanort?"
Ienzo is speechless. "What?"
"He was there too. And those two punks as well. You miss them?" Dilan's stare is piercing.
"Isa and Lea are fine," Ienzo reminds him. "And that's different."
"How?"
"They came… later. And we… know what happened to Xehanort," Ienzo stumbles over both the thought and the words. Lea and Isa were never truly part of their group, and Xehanort is a different mess entirely. "But he's… he's Braig."
Ienzo's voice cracks slightly. The answer he gives is pathetic, yet it feels like it should explain everything. He may be old enough to drink now, but he's still a child. "Dilan," he says quietly. "Am I wrong to feel this way?"
Dilan doesn't say anything at first. He clinks his cup against Braig's again and downs another shot. Ienzo considers his own, and then takes a small sip. The smoky liquor goes down easier this time, though the aftertaste still makes him shudder.
He's halfway through his second shot before Dilan refills it again.
"Listen," he says soberly. "You can't compare your emotions to ours. It doesn't work like that. To me, Braig was a colleague, and, occasionally, a friend. To you, he was that and, unfortunately," Dilan's face makes his opinion clearly known, "family. You're allowed to miss him."
The words are both a comfort and a stab.
"So then, are you saying that you don't? At all?"
"I'm saying how I feel and how you feel are not going to be the same," Dilan says and falls into another long silence. His eyes are on Braig's cup. "The Braig I knew disappeared a long time ago. I've made my peace with it already."
"Oh," is all Ienzo can say. When was "a long time ago", he wants to ask. During their time as Nobodies? When Xehanort first appeared? Before that even? Who was the Braig he knew?
"To answer your question though, I wouldn't pour out a cup of good expensive mezcal for someone I didn't still think about sometimes," he continues and fixes Ienzo with a stern look. "But the truth is, and you won't like this answer, it's easier without him."
Dilan's right. Ienzo doesn't like that answer at all. He doesn't like it because he finds he can't disagree. Atoning for their sins, reconciling with Master Ansem, moving on…it's not easy, but it is a clear straight path.
Braig always complicates things.
Ienzo's grip around his plastic cup tightens. Dilan regards him carefully for a moment, before he leans over and picks up the cup they poured for Braig. He then tips it over, and lets the mezcal splash against the ground. He stops halfway, and silently hands the cup to Ienzo to finish.
"I really don't think he's gone though," Ienzo says quietly.
"I don't either. Too much against it," Dilan admits, somewhat bitterly. "Wherever he is, good for him. I'm pouring one out for the old friend."
Ienzo considers it. Then he accepts that cup and carefully pours out the rest of it. "For my guardian," he says, staring at the puddle that remains. "Despite everything, I'm grateful to you, and I hope you're doing well."
The platform they're on has a slight curve, and a storm drain in the center. The spilled mezcal slowly starts to run towards it. That's good, Ienzo thinks absently. Master Ansem wouldn't like them dumping alcohol like that.
"If Braig did return," Dilan says suddenly as they watch the alcohol trickle away into the drain, "what would you do?"
Ienzo shrugs. "I don't know," he admits wistfully, because a part of him still wants it to happen, wants Braig to see how they're carrying on, wants him to join, wants things to be just like they were in his boyhood. "I think, maybe, I'd just want to ask him if it was all worth it."
A pause.
"What about you?"
Dilan scoffs, leans back against the steps, and downs another shot in one gulp.
"First thing? I'd punch him in the face."
~fin~
A/N: (Why mezcal? Because my boss happened to mention it the day before I started this, so it was the first drink that popped into my head. It's also a fun word to say.)
Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed!
I really wish we'd gotten some interactions between Xigbar and the other Apprentices (or at least Vexen!) There's so much to rethink with him now, but I still believe he genuinely cared about the others and is the reason they are not Norts. And that when Ienzo said in KH3 that they have friends they want to get back, he was counting Braig.
It still feels kinda weird to not have him with the Apprentice group now haha...