The room is silent, it has been for the last fifteen minutes, while Bing sits in Dark's office. He knows better than to say anything without being asked a question. When Dark is ready to initiate whatever this meeting is for, Bing will know it and then, and only then, will he be allowed to speak. In the meantime, the grey leader is sat going through a few files that have been left on his desk.
Eventually though, they're put aside, Dark stands and straightens himself, cracking his broken body and looking down at the cyborg before he speaks.
"Your mother is dead."
. . . .
"Wha-what?" The world shrinks around him, as Bing's breath stutters and catches in his chest. "H-how?"
There's no response. Dark hates it when Bing gets emotional, it's stupid and he won't tolerate that kind of bullhonky. And though Bing is almost certain that he's done his best to hold in the pain, as he felt something just rip through his chest like a serrated knife, he feels a tear roll down his cheek. Stuttering out an apology, he reaches up desperate to hide it.
It takes forever for him to wipe his face clean, new tears falling to replace those he removes. Jutting out his chin, holding his breath and doing his best to mimic Google's stoic face, the real robot's lack of emotion, Bing tries to swallow the lump in his throat.
Dark just watches and Bing waits. If he asks again, Dark will never tell him. If he leaves before Dark dismisses him, Bing will be excluded from meetings. If he cries, Dark will order Dr Iplier to stop their sessions…..not that they do much of anything but he gets the feeling he might have a greater need of his next session.
Eventually, Dark calmly explains that there was a break in, she took a nasty fall and was admitted to hospital. She passed away shortly after.
"Did she-did she die alone?" Bing manages to ask without cracking his mask of indifference.
Dark doesn't smile, but his lips quirk in that way they do when he doesn't sympathise with someone's pain, when he's not quite enjoying their suffering but he's not quite not enjoying it either. "What does it matter?"
After he's dismissed, Bing simply stands and leaves, striding through the corridors and feeling as though he's being held together by nothing more than tape, likely to fall apart any second. He's half way back to his room when the tears break free because he just can't hold them in. He runs, speeding down the halls as fast as his legs can carry him, desperate to get to his room before his sobbing draws someone to him.
The door slams behind Bing as he gets there, a click as the door is locked and a light thud as Bing knocks his forehead against the door. The half sob he lets out breaks the carefully constructed wall he'd tried to hide his emotions behind, all of them cascading out as he lets loose his pain in a heart-wrenching cry.
Bing slumps to the floor as his legs give way and fold under him and surely he must be screaming the pain out of him, but it's not going anywhere, sitting heavy in his chest like a rock. His tears, his screams, his pain, do nothing to blur out the image of his mother dying completely alone.
'It matters' he should have told Dark, should have screamed it at him. It matters. It matters to him if his momma was alone, if she was hurt, if she was scared. Bing should have told Dark that but he didn't. Because he's a coward. An asshole of a son. If his momma could see him now, she would be ashamed.