Note: Finny-centric, manga-verse, immediately after chapter 33. There was no beta for this, so please let me know of any grammar or spelling mistakes. Also, let me know if I'm writing anyone too badly out-of-character. I would much rather be heartbroken for three seconds than sit here with an inaccurate-sounding fic for several months.
They shielded themselves from the blast, rubble landing all around them. As the last echoes died down, the servants of the Phantomhive family turned back towards the manor to survey the damage. A large portion of that wall was missing, but not quite to the point where the structural integrity of the building was in danger. Everything that had been inside the kitchen was reduced to charred rubble. And there was still the rest of the house to worry about - smashed windows, the remains of destroyed statues and paintings, the ruined staircase, bloodstains, and corpses. All of which had to be taken care of before morning, so the Lady Elizabeth wouldn't suspect anything.
Bard was the first to speak. "Damn, this is going to be a long night." His words were somewhat unnecessary, but they helped relieve the tension of the moment. The three looked at each other for a moment and nodded in silent agreement before moving to clean up the mess as much as they could. They knew, of course, that once Sebastian returned he would make the house appear as if the fight had never occurred. None of them could fathom how he did it. He just did.
It came without warning, that is, no more warning than could be expected of the situation. As Finny helped remove rubble from what had so recently been the kitchen - Bard and Mey-Rin had disposed of the corpses - he started to shake violently, as if hit by a sudden chill.
"Finny?" Mey-Rin asked, concerned. "Are you all right?"
The youngest of the servants shook his head wordlessly, dropping the remains of what had been the chopping counter to cover his face. After a short moment, he slumped down against the nearest wall, still shaking. He didn't look up when he felt a hand on his shoulder. "Hey, Finn. What's wrong?" Bard's rough voice asked from somewhere above him.
Finny looked up, eyes damp with tears. "Those were people," He said quietly. "Those were real, human people. And we- I-" He choked on his words, starting to cry again. Bard and Mey-Rin looked at each other as Finny buried his face into his knees. They understood.
Bard had been a soldier. One of the first things soldiers have to learn on a battlefield is to never think of their opponents as people with lives of their own, families, hopes, dreams. It would distract them from their main goal - to kill the enemy before they are killed. There is no time to consider the moral aspects of the fight when there are bullets flying, knives flashing, and every second could be the last.
Mey-Rin had been a sniper, an assassin. Assassins were trained to think of their targets as unworthy of life if they could not properly defend themselves. A human would be reduced until they were nothing but a target. Emotions were unnecessary, they would only be detrimental to the proper mindset. A sniper would never have to worry about facing the bodies of the dead after the fact, either. They worked alone, and would be gone from the scene as soon as they knew their target had fallen.
The two were still human, though. They knew better than most the feeling of guilt that came when one realized that they had taken a human life. Finny had not had the training that Bard and Mey-Rin had. He didn't have the right mental walls to block out the feelings of guilt, disgust, even hatred for one's own actions. Neither of the two older servants could offer any true solace from an attack that came from Finny's own heart.
"You want to rest for a while?" Bard asked as gently as he could. "Me and Mey-Rin can take care of the rest of the clean-up."
Finny nodded wordlessly, remaining silent as he heard the other two go back to work and eventually leave to the other parts of the manor. He didn't call for them to come back, to stay with him, no matter how much he wanted to. It wasn't his place to complain about being left alone, not after they had all done so much for him.
"The young master doesn't give me injections every day."
Master Phantomhive and Sebastian had pulled him out of the hellhole that had been the only thing he'd known. Growing up, Finny had experienced only harsh restraints instead of a mother's loving embrace. Instead of a kind father, there were only faceless 'doctors' that spoke about him as if he were an object, that poured liquid fire through his veins. He didn't have a name, only a single letter and three numbers separating himself from the other subjects. The young master and Sebastian had given him everything - a name, a family, an education, a life. The only thing left unanswered was how he had gotten to the horrible laboratory in the first place, and that was an answer Finny had decided he didn't want to know.
"The young master doesn't kill my friends."
Finny could always trust that there would be someone around. He would never be able to think about the young master and Sebastian as family - how could he possibly think to compare himself to those two? - but it was a completely different story with the others. Mey-Rin had become a sort of mother for him, helping Sebastian with teaching and gently correcting Finny when he got something wrong. Tanaka was like a father, a sort of benevolent overseer of the manor's social life. Bard had become Finny's older brother, caring but not exactly hesitant to give him a whack upside the head when he got too annoying.
"The young master doesn't lock me up."
Yes, Master Ciel had given Finny everything. If he and Sebastian had never picked Finny up and away from that place, he would probably have died by now. Instead, he was free to go outside whenever he liked and to talk to whoever he wanted. And the others would listen to him, no matter how stupid his ramblings must have sounded. There was no way he would ever be able to repay the debt he owed the young master, so he would obey every order he was given. If he was told to work on the garden, he would work on the garden. If he was told to rebuild a wing of the manor, he would rebuild the wing. If he was told to kill any intruders, then he would kill.
"I love it here. That's why I decided I'd protect it."
But no matter how much he wanted to, he couldn't just look at his side of the situation. The people who had been attacking the manor had been human. They weren't like the scientists who had tortured him for much of his life. They weren't like the mice and rats that sometimes made their way into the building and would have to be disposed of. He remembered the way the two children had reacted when they saw that their friend - Jumbo, they had called him? - had died. He remembered the way they would try to protect each other.
If it had been Bard, Mey-Rin, and Finny in the intruders' place, they would have acted the exact same way. It was an idea he couldn't get out of his head. Just as the Phantomhive household servants were a family to each other, the intruders had been a family. The intruders were human, just as he was. Probably even more so. There was no chance that killing them in such cold blood could have been a good thing.
"Exactly how long do you plan on sitting there?" A cool, composed voice cut through Finny's thoughts. He looked up to see Sebastian looking down at him with slight disdain. Finny blinked, realizing that he had no idea how long Sebastian had been there, or even how long he himself had been sitting in that one spot. "If you are finished with feeling sorry for yourself, then you should get up and help repair the manor. We can't have young Miss Elizabeth suspecting the truth."
Finny nodded in embarrassment. Good or bad, right or wrong, it didn't matter. He owed the young master, and he owed Sebastian. It was of no consequence what the intruders had thought of their own actions. Finny had been given orders, and he could never have disobeyed.