Final chapter, posted at the promised time. Hope this wraps things up sufficiently.
Disclaimer: I don't own the Suite Life of Zack and Cody.
So Zack's reign in the circle came to an abrupt halt with the death of the scheming Chris. Even though Zack showed little remorse at the time, he never fully recovered from the trauma of killing another man. He was intended as a fighter, maybe, but not as a killer. Cody had not inflicted the deathblow, but on this topic the twins forever shared nightmares.
Another thing that pained Zack was the disappearance of John Cypher, for whom he had had a great deal of respect. He never saw him, nor even heard of again. If he had known that Chris was the culprit, he mightn't have felt such guilt. Or maybe he would have, it is impossible to say.
Drew moved schools almost immediately after Chris' death. He and Cody would meet one day in their thirties, but neither recognised the other.
Apart from these, life returned to a reflection of what it had once been. Cody's grades steadily improved again as they attended school more regularly, but to the casual eye, apart from the tiny scars on both the twin's faces, little had changed. Those six months could never have happened.
But things had changed. Zack accepted Cody's presence: he would have liked to be able to be so much closer, but a void seemed to have grown to separate them, and he knew from the beginning they could never cross it. Carey continued to look after them at the hotel, but there was always a slight undercurrent of tension, and Carey could not remove it.
Chris' body was found three days later. Despite being semi-rotted, an extensive autopsy (which failed to reveal the killer) presented traces of slow-working terminal brain cancer, which would have begun about six months previously. How much had this affected his judgement? Even his parents admitted it wasn't clear; he had always been a thinker.
End of Epilogue
That chapter was pretty vague, I know, but I was only rounding off and didn't see any need for anything dramatic. Like I said, you don't really need to review for this chapter.
And I just remembered... I've completed my second fanfiction. Hooray! What, have a break? Stop for a bit? Are you kidding...