They are alone in the woods when it happens. Over two decades ago, he would cry on his Noatak's shoulder when Yakone was especially harsh.
This isn't real. Tarrlok can't be hiking after his older brother, pushing past flora to find a location to settle for the night. He'll wake up from this nightmare, and Noatak will be gone. He'll resume his cyclical life as a venerable member of the Council.
He wants to die. So very much. There is a hitch in his brother's steps, and he detects that Noatak is about to collapse, though he never speaks about how exhausted he must be. As stoic and aloof as always. He spent the entire ride steering the boat while Tarrlok considered whether or not to end their lives.
Just when he was certain, Noatak turned with this unspeakable look in his eyes, telling his brother to rest. It reminded Tarrlok of their mother, so he recanted his decision. Perhaps Noatak was entrenched in a fond memory, though an eerie suspicion comes over Tarrlok that his brother surmised just what was about to transpire. If he had set fire to the fuel, there's no chance either of them would've survived.
They sit in a clearing. Given his filthy and dejected state, Tarrlok doesn't complain that they are wading in dirt. It smells of vermin and dew. Patches of moss blight a rotting log to the right of them. The canopy blocks out almost all light.
"I'm glad you agreed to come with me," Noatak says with a small, forced smile as the cold sets in. "I'm sorry for what I've put you through." Yes, none of that "what I had to do to you" rigmarole; but as if a single, scant apology can span over years of lies and abandonment. What he's been through.
What Tarrlok's been through? Spirits, what have they put the city through? Where is Avatar Korra?
"We're better off dead," Tarrlok says, no emotions etched into his features. He rests his hands in his lap. They're crampling horribly.
The unexpected happens. It's not immediate. His brother's eyes glaze over, his lips loosening. They peer at each other. Then a wetness trickles down Noatak cheeks, his eyebrows lowering.
Tarrlok startles. This is Amon, the mocking voice on the radio, the person who so ruthlessly took everything away from him. The boy who protected him against their father. Hesitantly, Tarrlok reaches out to touch Noatak's shoulder, and his older brother leans into him.
Here they are, their roles reversed. He isn't even Noatak. He's the child Noatak was never allowed to be.
Noatak still has power over him, but now he's sobbing into his baby brother's shoulder and Tarrlok is without words, and his own breaths grow ragged, uneven. Should he cry as well? Is he going to, whether he calculates it or not? He hasn't cried in a long while, not even when he was silently begging for death. Everything seemed so hopelessly clear then.
(You're all I have left in the world.)
Unsurely, nervously, they both wrap their arms around each other. Like when they would play as boys and Noatak would comfort his brother when Tarrlok fell in the snow, when he sobbed and scuffled and stomped his feet listlessly as Yakone called him a failure.
Such a bizarre gesture from both of them. Any spectators would no doubt shake their heads, bereft of an explanation as to why a corrupt politician and a terrorist, his most hated enemy, are hugging and weeping together in the middle of nowhere.
Tarrlok doesn't believe words can scab over the blistering wounds, but perhaps there is a way for them to have a second chance.