They hold Two's memorial service in the lobby of the Deck. Everyone dresses in their formal wear. Not dress uniforms—the Deck doesn't even have regular ones, they attract too much attention—but the men wear tuxes and the women wear black dresses or skirts with blouses. Six had always found it vaguely amusing, that even after hundreds of years the traditional wear for pretty much anything is the one thing to remain unchanged.
Now, though, he sits in his chair, spine ramrod straight, eyes forward. His chest feels like it's collapsing in on itself under the guilt of his forgetting about Two's death, of not knowing that Two had been religious, that he had failed the mission Two had died for.
His mouth tastes bitter with it, with the words that slither up his throat and press up against his teeth, thick and slimy and god, he was so sorry Two, why did you trust me how can anyone trust me I let you die I let you die I. Let. You. Die.
Throughout the affair, Six keeps his face neutral, professional—he doesn't think Two would have minded, but knows that if he had he would have granted forgiveness in a heartbeat—because if he lets one emotion through, slouches for one second he will shatter.
Instead, he watches, keeps eyes that beg to be closed open, and counts his heartbeats.
Babum. Babum. Babum. Babum.
Your team. Your duty. Your friend. Is dead.
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Six leaves as soon as is proper, sliding out of his tie as soon as the door of his office snicks safely shut behind him. Sliding down the wall, Six puts his head in his hands and feels himself shake. He doesn't cry, though—hasn't since he was small and King trained it out of him. Six wonders what that makes him, that training is stronger than grief for the death of a friend, and knows the answer from the whispers his coworkers thought were quiet enough that he shouldn't have been able to hear.
Emotionless. Monster. Why is he even here? It's not like he cares.
It takes him a moment to notice someone is knocking on his door. Palm flat against the ground, Six shoves himself up, straightens, and opens the door. Kyntak is there, and he strolls in, hands in his pockets. For once he isn't smiling. Leaning back against Six's desk, he faces his brother and the door, sighing. "Knew you'd be hiding here." Casually, he asks, "Mind if I join you?"
Six shrugs and shuts the door, slowly going tense because he wants to be alone, needs to scream and shake and feel the pain without anyone seeing. But Kyntak needs that just as much as Six does, and prefers to do it in the company of others rather than alone, like everything he does.
Besides, Six's grief wasn't going anywhere. He can deal with it later. When he turns back around, Kyntak is wrangling off his bow tie-chosen more because neither brother wanted to be confused for the other, ever again, rather than personal preference.
Finally getting it off, Kyntak looks up into his brother's silence and asks, "You okay? I know you and Two were friends. Or as close as you can come to feeling friendship, that is."
His lips curve up and fuck, Six knows it's a joke, knows Kyntak's made plenty of them like it before, knows it shouldn't bother him, but he's guilty and grieving and so, so sick of the whispers. The comment is completely unexpected and it hurts, vividly, a sting in his chest so bright that it takes Six's breath away.
"Get out."
His voice is flat, hard, furious in its lack of emotion. Kyntak blinks, surprised, before his face crumples into apology. Reaching for Six's shoulder, he says, voice pained, "I'm sorry, Six, that wasn't—"
But Six steps back, shoulders tensing, and wants to scream, shove his brother out the door or punch him the face because suddenly it's like he was never sad at all, just utterly furious, because it wasn't fair and Two was dead and he was useless and everything turns red and his pulse roars in his ears.
But Kyntak doesn't deserve that, it's not his fault Six is overreacting, is angry, so what comes out is a terse, "You have nothing to be sorry for, but," He takes a deep breath, forcing the tension and hostility from his body and voice, "please, just leave me the hell alone."
Kyntak's hand drops, hurt, but when he turns to leave he stops and snaps, "You know what? I do have something to be sorry for, and you're damn well going to listen to it. I'm sorry for that tasteless joke, I'm sorry we lost an agent, and I'm sorry you just lost a friend because Vanish wanted to kidnap us!"
Six takes a step forward, into Kyntak's space and spits, "No, Two died because of me. I was leading the mission when everything went to hell, I left him there, I made the call, and then I couldn't even stop you from getting kidnapped! Vanish might of killed him but that agents death, that's all on me!"
Silence falls in his office. Suddenly, Six realizes his fists are clenched and his breath is coming out in heaves. He relaxes, suddenly, the anger draining out of him just as quickly as it came, leaving behind a hollow, empty shell. Six feels wrung out, tired and sore, and can't even summon the energy to be embarrassed at his outburst. Exhausted, he whispers, tells Kyntak what he hadn't told anyone, not even King. "The last thing he told me is 'I trust you."' The words are bitter on Six's tongue, but less so than when they went unsaid, so he continues, "And now I can't even ask him how he could manage to be so wrong."
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Kyntak blurts the first thing that come to mind—"But it wasn't your fault."
And there it is again—barely perceptible tensing, curling away, hiding. Kyntak hadn't known quite how hard Six was taking Two's death—he'd known Six was sad, of course, even Six wasn't that tense without feeling some strain, but Kyntak hadn't imagined the idiot was blaming himself. And don't get him wrong, he was sad, but he had mourned, had gotten over it as he had gotten over many things in his life. After Kyntak had left his orphanage, he'd gotten used to putting things behind him, or at least to the side until he could deal with them properly. And while he might have only known Six for a few months, it didn't take much time with him to realize he did the exact opposite. Six held onto things, let them shape him, let's them bury down and mold him into someone who sees a friend die and keeps moving, keeps fighting, unaffected. All of which is good, up until there was nothing left to fight and it all catches up with him, and he winds up shutting down in an elevator in the middle of a mission.
"It wasn't," Kyntak repeats, "it was none of ours."
Six doesn't react except to flinch slightly, so Kyntak reaches out and yanks him into a hug. Six is stiff, unsure at the contact and he doesn't hug back, clearly has no idea how to, but that's a whole entire problem to be addressed later.
Fiercely, he whispers in his brother's ear,"Two could look after himself. His death is not on you, or me, it's on Vanish's hands, and absolutely no one else's."
Silence, then, "I think you're one of the few who really believes that."
Kyntak pauses a moment, before it hits him that Six has the same hearing he does, that he'd heard that dumbass Nine muttering under his breath, quiet enough he probably thought only the people next to him could hear. His brother had obviously missed the glares the other agent had been receiving, but that didn't matter right now. Kyntak had already been planning a talk with the other agent anyway, maybe even a demotion—ill will towards other agents tended to end in bloodshed, planned or not, and that he had both questioned and reacted this badly to a call that had still saved lives showed an attitude better suited for desk work than out in the field.
But now the Joker was insanely angry, because even if Nine was only blowing off steam with a worse attitude than most, he'd caused this. Quite frankly, Kyntak was debating on whether or not his strict 'no going all out in training with other agents' rule was worth repealing, but again, that was an entirely different problem to be dealt with later.
Now he simply waits until, finally, Six sags against him. His shoulders start to shake, and his breath sounds ragged as Six not-cries against him.
Kyntak drags them both to the floor, murmuring vague comfort. They sit there, alone, for a long, long time.
Because they never really mentioned Two's death or dealt with it in RC, and something tells me Kyntak would deal with it better than his brother, and also there's not nearly enough h/c with these two in the fandom (especially considering how many opportunities for it the series gives us.) Reviews are very much appreciated!