Disclaimer: I don't own a thing. A. N. Prompt was Men of Letters... Well, what can I say. Ketch is like a fungus. He grows on you. He certainly did on me. I didn't even know I shipped these two until I saw the prompt!
Companionless
Arthur didn't expect to get lonely. He knew better than that, or at least he should. He was a Man of Letters, for God's sake. They drove the 'do not get attached' point into you well before letting you on the field. Just survive and murder whoever you're told to murder.
So what if he'd made a deal with the witch to make sure that he would survive...even when he didn't. That was just sensible strategy. Fine, technically he should have shared the knowledge with everyone else. That was what they were supposed to do - accumulate intelligence and use it to handle monsters of all kinds.
But the same lesson that taught him not to bond, not really, taught him they were all disposable, any time. Well, even if he was surely, in the grand scheme of things, not indispensable, he was fond enough of himself to hold onto that one. He didn't fancy being killed twice, and held in the middle, if the higher ups decided that he'd become a liability. The organization's duty might be to the country, or whatever else they spouted, but Arthur's priority would be himself, ta very much. Someone's had to be.
On second thought, maybe he should have picked at least one person to share his secret with. Even Doctor Who picked companions, after all. And...no, he wasn't jealous of those two messes squatting in their bunker. Sure, they surprised him, right from the start. For a duo whose failures they'd been sent to clean up (which really should have been done by the local branch of the Men of Letters, but they'd managed to get themselves wiped out decades earlier...Americans), they were surprisingly functional. And yes, half of the problems had been caused by their unwillingness to give each other up. But he was also starting to suspect that their bond was the reason they'd managed to handle what they did. At least, that was what Mick said he figured out from the transcripts of the bug they'd planted. If they'd discovered the secret to Sam's hair, he'd kept it to himself, though. Not like Arthur could be bothered going through that himself.
Did he miss the organization, now he'd dropped off their radar? Nope. Freelance wasn't as bad as the higher-ups would make it sound. At least he picked his own questionable clients. And could drop them if he was too annoyed with them. The organization was effective, sure. But their claims of indisputable perfection, of the sanctity of the code? Bullshit.
Damn, he missed Mick, though. If only he'd been more honest with him. About so many things. But you couldn't trust anyone, and he had too much self-preservation instinct to stray. Odd how, wondering who he might have shared his little trick with, the man sprang to mind. Not lady Bevell and all the fun they'd had together. Not anyone else of the people, in and outside the Men of Letters, he'd used for an oxytocine hit. That earnest, funny, sometimes cute as an eager puppy, nerdy, and - in the end - idiot he'd worked with so long.
Mick had really bought into the whole code. As if it was a source of honour and morals and whatever instead of a means of control. The only problem was that control was a necessity, wasn't it? If they didn't fill that void, someone else would, and it might be someone even worse. Arthur had known all along, and not cared particularly. They'd trained him, and let him loose on the targets that they'd chosen. Things could have been worse. Better too, maybe, but if you wondered about that too long, might as well find a djinn and let him eat you.
He thought it was obvious. That they all just paid lip service because well, that's what you do. But no, Mick wasn't like him. He should have known. Mick had gone and let the Winchesters work him up to a...crisis of conscience, or something. The man honestly thought he could make things better. Stand up to everyone, maybe prompt a change from within. (Yes, he'd hacked the place's cameras. just because he didn't ask questions when Mick had disappeared, it didn't mean he wasn't curious.)
Frankly, if he had shared the witch's little trick, he'd probably spend a good chunk of Mick's just-resurrected state by tearing him a new one over his lack of common sense. But the man would have never kept that to himself. Serving the people or whatever ideal was bubbling inside him. He'd immediately dismissed the idea.
Never mind that, though. He was alive and free. If he'd learned anything here, it was that there was never just one path to what you wanted. So what if he hadn't thought ahead? This seemed to be the land of "get in trouble, see how you can dig yourself out of it." He might just have to see if he could find another option.