Grace had done all the planning. She stood a ways off now, dressed in matronly black, face buried in a fistful of tissues. Her mother put her arm around her, and the two held each other, a unit, isolated from the mass of mourning friends and family who stood around the open grave. Everyone came to the burial: Shaun's friend from school, his teachers, extended family from both Grace's Ethan's side, the the police, the FBI, and the journalist. Ethan wished he could credit his tremors to the cold, but standing right by the grave's edge, he sensed the crowd behind him. In his mind, the swarm of people occupied the entire plot, spilling into the streets, people pushing and fighting in the outskirts to get closer to the front, forcing themselves through to see the burial of the most recent development in their favorite Sunday morning show. All the city came to gawk, he thought, he just had to turn around and see.

The chill of the damp air crept into his bones. He felt each joint lock, and each muscle freeze, spreading slowly and agonisingly through his body. It seized his throat last. The people were swarming. He broke the ice in his elbows and gripped his neck. Pushing, fighting, forcing. He dragged a breath in. Can't take crowds. He squeezed his eyes shut. Ice splintered his bones. He turned around.

Thirty people stood behind him, almost all familiar faces. Towards the back was Madison, whose prying brown eyes permeated through the crowd and reassured him in her unspoken confident way. Along the edge of police, who held their caps in delicately folded, solemn hands, stood Norman Jayden. He folded his ARI into his pocket and Ethan saw in his expression an indescribable brokenness that until now, he had only seen in himself. Norman tipped his head down as if to survey the mud and slick that the plot had been reduced to, and slowly- almost cautiously, as if in danger- walked towards Ethan. Ethan turned forward again and kept his eyes fixed on the open grave, the loose damp dirt piled beside it, and the four foot coffin, the child's coffin, that would soon be covered at the bottom of the ditch.

"How are you holding up?" Norman asked, his voice higher with softness and sweetness as he stood by Ethan, placing his hands in the pockets of his black jacket.

Ethan kept his eyes on the grave. "I don't know," he said hollowly. "I don't know." He nervously fingered at the burn holes in his blue sweater. The old blood had long since browned, and the biggest scabs had since peeled reluctantly from the stitching. "I never thought I would have to do this again."

"Ethan, I'm so sorry-"

"You don't have to be sorry," his voice broke. Tears rushed to his eyes and spilled down his cheeks. He looked past the casket, a few rows down, for Jason's headstone but his vision was too obscured to find it. "I guess we should have thought about it, burying the boys together. The children's lot is separate from the regular one, you know. If we... I, I would have bought two spots together for them." His words wavered in clarity and comprehensibility so by the end of his sentence, Norman struggled to catch what his final few words were. Ethan stuttered another half-sentence of babbling, then crossed one arm across his body, and brought one had up to cover his eyes. His mouth pulled into a strained frown that bore all his teeth, gritted together in paralysed pain. A sharp inhale shook his whole body, and his shoulders rose towards his ears with every quiet, vocalised sob.

Norman placed his hand on Ethan's shoulder and squeezed it firmly, as if to say "I'm here for you; let it out; it's okay." as Ethan trembled and heaved his sorrow out in short, grief-stricken breaths. It was a moment beyond words. Norman wracked his brain for something to say, but nothing seemed fitting. Nothing could match the outreach and caring that placing his hand on his shoulder demonstrated. Ethan kept his hand over his eyes and unwrapped his other arm from around his body. He let it hang at his side for a moment, then hugged around Norman's waist, still huffing small cries through his teeth.

Norman hesitated, but didn't pull away. Ethan's gesture had surprised him, after all, it was his job to protect people, not comfort them. Digging through his registers of psych knowledge for something that might help, he remembered that if someone asks to be embraced, always be the last one to let go, because you never know how long that person might need it. He returned the gesture, putting his arm around him, and letting Ethan take solace in his presence. Whatever Ethan needed him for in this moment, he would do, and he would be.

Ethan turned his face to where his and Norman's shoulders' overlapped and shielded his face as he muttered, "I can't take this. Can't handle it. I just can't handle it…"

"Take it easy, it's gonna be alright," Norman cooed.

"I miss him," he cried, grasping at the hem of Norman's coat like he was trying to wring the water from it. Something to keep in the palm of his hand, to hold on to.

"I know," Norman whispered, as Ethan's contagious grief radiated from his touch.

"He didn't deserve this." He tugged on his coat. Coldness tainted his voice and his fussing waxed more aggravated. "He never did anything wrong. I'm the one at fault here. It should have been me."

Norman looked towards Ethan's face hidden behind his hand. "Ethan," he said delicately, "don't talk like that."

"He was just a kid. I should have died in the car crash, or the electric building, or the firefight with the drug dealer. Shaun never had any say in this. It should have been me." He pulled more forcefully at the jacket, trying to find something that only he knew was there.

It may have been what Ethan was saying, or the sense of paranoia that the FBI had instilled in him, but a suspicious feeling crept up the back of Norman's neck and set him on guard. "Stop it, Ethan, what are you-?"

"You understand, Agent Jayden. I'm the one that should have died," Ethan said with an eerie calm washing his voice, as his hand found what he was looking for, and lifted the gun from the concealed holster.

He pushed Norman back and away from him and dashed towards the open grave. Norman staggered backwards on the muddy surface and when he had regained his balance, looked up to see Ethan standing in the foot of Shaun's grave, the barrel of the gun pressed decidedly to his head. Ethan squeezed his eyes shut and wiped his eyes with the hand that held the gun, cocked it, and replaced it to his temple.

"I'm sorry!" He screamed across the collection of friends family and loved ones, shattering in front of an audience. "I'm sorry, I can't take it anymore!"

Audible gasps and a few screams erupted from the people gathered around. They stood paralysed so as to not get caught in the collateral of what would happen next. Norman pushed his way to the front of the crowd again, and held his hands up, displaying his palms in a subliminal gesture to prove he wasn't a threat. "Wait a minute, Ethan," he called over persistent sorrowful cries, "Wait just a minute. Don't do this. Let's be rational here, okay?"

Ethan opened his misty eyes and looked to Grace with a contorted expression that reflected only a fraction of the perdition that tormented him. "Grace, I'm sorry. I wish I had been a better husband to you. I've always loved you and I always will, and I'll be sure to tell our boys the same thing."

Grace's eyes were wide and terrified and she whispered quiet utterances to herself. Reading her lips, she silently mouthed the words "no, oh, no, no, not you too."

"Ethan, listen to my voice. Focus only on my voice," Norman pressed, taking slow and even steps towards him. He glanced over his shoulder at the other police who had attended and saw them creeping up through the crowd, ready to draw. He folded three fingers down towards his palm delicately until he could see them stand down. No use overwhelming him- might just make things messier. "Stay calm, it's gonna be okay, but you have to put the gun down first."

Ethan twisted the barrel tighter into brain, muttering breathy apologies and reasonings. "I can't, I can't."

"I'm here to help. We're all here to help. Stay with us. You're stronger than this, Ethan. You made it through the trials-

"That's when Shaun was alive. I had something to live for."

Norman swallowed nervously and persisted, "you can deal with this grief. We're all here for you. Put the gun down, and this will all be over."

"This will all be over," he iterated, and tightened his finger on the trigger.

"Take it easy," his voice softened as the gap between them closed painstakingly inch by inch. "You risked your life to try and save him. I did, too. You don't have to prove yourself anymore, Ethan. Killing yourself won't bring him back."

"I know this won't bring him back," he reasoned. "But I've driven five miles into traffic for him, electrocuted myself for him, cut off one of my fingers for him, killed someone for him." He exhaled a shaky breath as each memory flashed viscerally though his mind. "Doing this won't bring him back, but it will let me see him again. It will."

Grace keeled over, reduced to violent sobs, before screaming out, "Ethan, stop it! Stop it!" and the sound of jawlines rubbing against collars swelled in the crowd as everyone turned their attention. "Why didn't you come and talk to me? You didn't have to do all of those things all on your own. I know we're not what we used to be, but, God, he was my son, too!" she shook her head and said quietly to herself, "Who have you become? He was my son, too."

"Grace," Ethan breathed.

"Ethan, no!" Norman screamed, madly reaching out in an attempt to disarm him.

The gun sounded off, echoed by the screams that erupted from the crowd. Ethan fell backwards into the grave, knowing nothing but blackness.