A/N: Mini 10 minute fic challenge from Mako. Prompt: Soothing.
Punishment
Red... so much red... thick and red and stickier than he ever remembered it being before.
Abel had been in more fights than he could remember. Broken bones, severely beaten, and even mutilated the hapless Terrans who had stood against him or his family. But this was the first time he had killed someone.
The cooling corpse on the floor was still wearing an expression of mild curiousity, interrupted from his task without even enough time to register surprise before he had been shot at point blank range. His head had exploded, a concave pattern of brain matter and skull fragments, an oddly beautiful sight.
He was angry, furious, agonized... his chest aching as though he had forgotten how to breathe, head swimming with grief and confusion.
What had this man done, but be the coroner who had officially pronounced his brother's death? Nothing... but wasn't that enough? That bastard had confirmed his other half had been stolen, taken from him without regard for how perfect he had been. Always obedient to them, always excelling no matter what his task. Abel had never been up to his standard, it was something he had come to accept long ago. Where Cain shone, Abel only glowed... but it was enough, as long as Cain continued to shine his light brightly in his direction.
Now he never would again.
An accident... they had ruled nobody was to blame, and nobody would gain punishment for robbing him of one of his precious few reasons to keep living... to keep from slaughtering them all.
Where Lilith was his anchor, his voice of reason; Cain had been his comfort, the smile that could soothe him through the worst of life's pain.
Without him, who would soothe his soul?
Without him, who was he?
As Abel watched the pool of blood spread out from underneath his first kill, he cocked the gun with a dead look in his eyes and reflected that at least making them understand the depth of what they had done, would soothe the memory of hate.
