Kadaj's snicker of laughter echoed in Loz's ears, nearly causing him to grimace. To think that he had witnessed something so personal, so private…it made Loz's flesh crawl with fiery hatred. Simply sharing space with Kadaj was threatening to coax Loz's violent nature to the surface.

As Loz watched his brother start to idly walk around the dank, deserted room, Loz sincerely wished he'd not followed him. What was there to prove, or to gain? Standing up to him, like Mike so often urged him to do, was useless now. Kadaj already knew what Loz had done. "Fraternized with the enemy," "betrayed kin." Anything that Kadaj didn't plan was considered betrayal. The free thought and will that Loz had just discovered, living as a human being…they all were forms of treachery to Kadaj.

"You're such a fool." Kadaj's snakelike charm never failing to disappoint had Loz's fists clenched into tight balls of white fury at his sides. The tightening muscles rippled up into his shoulder and neck, throbbing as Loz's clenched so firmly. He knew that Kadaj would never be afraid of him, never take him seriously, but Loz couldn't help but think that if Kadaj continued to antagonize him, that he'd awaken some hidden beast deep within Loz. It was a childhood fantasy, Kadaj had always been the brain of every operation, and Loz had been the brawn. He felt like some hideous giant that was jerked around by a ring in his nose to do whatever his master dictated.

No more.

The younger brother neared the elder with a certain acquired swagger, calm and arrogant as if he carried the knowledge of the cosmos on his slender shoulders.

Lifting his icy glare, Loz eyed his brother carefully. There was no trust now. No camaraderie. The same blood, the kinship, it meant nothing to Kadaj anymore. As far as he was concerned, Loz was no longer family. Three months ago, that would have broken Loz's heart, possibly to the point of tears, but not now. Not after he'd opened his eyes to the reality that he'd spent so much time shutting out.

"Shut up." Loz hissed, his harsh words enhanced by a glacial visage. Every line on his face expressed nothing short of dire, immeasurable abhorrence.

Kadaj's brows arched for a moment as he heard Loz's gruff response. It was shocking enough that Loz hadn't already crumbled underneath Kadaj yet, but the angry retort was something that Kadaj would never have expected from Loz. Though he was older, he had always been easy to overpower.

Kadaj realized now that this was no longer the case, and his eyes flashed hatefully.

Narrowing his eyes into slits of indignant confusion, Kadaj took a step closer to Loz.

"What did you say to me?" he asked, standing still and allowing his eyes to rove over Loz, as if he were trying to detect something unseen and foul around his brother. He could almost smell that whore he'd been with earlier…Kadaj hated her.

"I said to shut the hell up." Loz repeated, the reply somehow iced fire, a wondrous strange frost. Hearing his brother, Kadaj's hand slid to the hilt of his sword and Loz rested his hand on the grip of his gun in case a quick draw was necessary. It grieved him that he had to feel this cautious around his brother, but Mike had opened his eyes. There was no longer any façade of trust and brotherhood. That had disappeared long ago, as Loz was just now realizing. Loz could finally see Kadaj for what he was; an obsessive, manipulative, selfish boy. It was insulting to think that, for so long, Loz had been his puppet.

He was going to sever the strings now.

Sneering, Kadaj's lip shrank back into a scornful curl.

"Don't let her ruin everything we've worked for."

"Everything we've worked for has been shit." Loz answered harshly, hardly allowing Kadaj to finish his sentence before interjecting.

Silver hair swished over his forehead as Kadaj shook his head, unable to believe what he was hearing.

"Don't do this, she's not worth it!" he bellowed, his voice reaching a panicked state. The worry in his eyes was unnerving, almost sad. He stood before Loz, a stripped man. Once the curtain had torn and fallen to the floor, there was nothing to hide Kadaj's intentions anymore. He was the master, Loz had been his dog.

"She is worth everything!" Loz's voice rose to such a huge crescendo that Kadaj was momentarily silenced by the hateful power that his kin was exerting.

Loz's fist was clenched tightly around his gun grip, half of his upper body becoming numb as he held onto the weapon so tightly.

"That bitch has turned you into a child and poisoned you against your own family! Don't let her destroy everything!"

"NO!"

Another shout threatened to rupture Kadaj's eardrum. "She has shown me what it means to be a man, and opened my eyes to my idiocy."

Pausing for a moment, Kadaj seemed to regain shards of his lost composure, piecing them together to try to rebuild himself.

"So a chance encounter with a whore that will give you what you want makes you think that you're in love? You'll throw everything away to be with your slut?" Kadaj asked, smirking spitefully. "It's a shame you're so immature, or else you would see that she's only using you. Don't cry, Loz. You were bound to find out eventually. Now come back to us, come back to Mother!"

Every cell inside of Loz shook with the active suppression of his hatred. Flashes of red tainted his vision as he began to indulge himself. Violent, deliciously violent images sped across his mind. Loz holding fistfuls of pristinely silver hair as Kadaj's severed neck poured hot crimson onto the floor; Loz gripping his brother's delicate neck and squeezing until he felt Kadaj's trachea snap…

"You could never understand. Sex can't make you a man." Knives danced across Loz's tongue as he tried to speak civilly to Kadaj. He never would have thought that Kadaj would inspire such disgust, Loz never imagined his life without his brothers in it…and yet, all he could think about was divorcing himself from his family entirely. Mother, his siblings…they didn't matter anymore.

Loz could feel his face flush with a bright daub of scarlet ire. Drawing his gun from the holster around his waist, Loz pointed it at Kadaj and cocked a bullet into place.

"Don't insult her. Mother is gone, she isn't worth anything. Nothing we thought was."

Kadaj remained smugly stoic, clearly unfazed by the thought of being shot, but was indeed shocked to see Loz pointing his gun at his face. Kadaj knew Loz's gun well, despite his brother's seeming indifference to use it in battle. He knew the mechanical advancements, and, despite how little credit he offered Loz, Kadaj knew Loz's aim was precise. A pull of the trigger, the slightest twitch of Loz's finger, and Kadaj would be nothing more than a bloody memory. Splatters on the floor for brotherhood.

Moving his head slightly to the side to look around the gun's barrel and into Loz's eye, Kadaj feigned another smug smirk and lifted his foot to take a step forward.

"Loz,"

Kadaj had not placed his boot on the ground when Loz moved his arm downward. His finger twitched. One lead bullet drove forth from the barrel. Though the echo was loud, Loz could hardly hear it over the echo of his bullet burying into layers of flesh, tissue, bone, and then exiting as rudely as it was come. Blood sprayed out from the wound, landing on the concrete behind Kadaj before he could consciously react.

A terrific shriek let Loz know that he had indeed shattered Kadaj's kneecap into powder. He collapsed to the ground, landing heavily on the leg that could no longer support him. Only the recycled ricochet of Kadaj's pained scream remained, but the gushing and gurgling of rapid blood loss was enough to remind Loz of his deed.

Turning to exit, Loz walked to the door and then paused, having no intent to aid his brother.

"Mother is dead, and should stay that way. Accept it and live your fucking life."

Resuming his abandoned step, Loz exited the building, the open door allowing the sunlight into a room filled with darkness. Not two feet from the door, Kadaj retaliated. Another bullet flew, striking Loz in the shoulder and embedding into his bone, thus allowing large amounts of crimson to spew from his body. Lurching forward, Loz stumbled to his knees, managing only to deflect his rendezvous with the ground for a moment before he crashed to the concrete. Air forced from his lips in a staggered grunt as he fell, a scarlet trail following his descent. Loz scratched his face on the concrete, leaving small pinpricks of blood.

Grimacing and forgetting his brother entirely, Loz gathered his feet from underneath him and used the arm he could to push himself wearily to his feet. Staggering greatly as his vision spasmed before him, Loz walked as quickly and steadily as he could in the direction of Mike's apartment.