Going Under

by thuribleofincense

In the time between Aries and The Lost Chord, Murdoc has a lot to think about. [One-shot].

"In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen."

It was a woman's voice, which caught Murdoc off guard. He peered through the mesh, trying to see who was on the other side, but he couldn't even make out a silhouette in the darkness. It almost seemed as if it were empty. He'd seen movies, and he was pretty sure there should have been a man on the other side. There shouldn't have been anyone here at all.

"You may confess your sins."

Murdoc barked out a strangled laugh, like the caw of a raven. "Love, I'm about ready to burst into flames here."

The door to the confessional shut firmly, wiping the grin from his face. He tried the handle and, while it would move, the door wouldn't budge. The door did not have a lock, but it was as if something were holding it closed from the outside. He charged into it with his shoulder, and while the door shuddered, it held shut. "Oi, Russ, that's not funny," he called out, assuming that the rest of the band were playing some kind of trick on him. "Lemme out!" But there was no response, not even fiendish chuckling.

The woman repeated, "You may confess your sins."

Murdoc whipped his head back around to regard the mesh separating himself from this disembodied voice. If it wasn't his band, she must have something to do with it. He was ready to redirect his objections towards her, but recoiled when he saw the eye which was all but pressed up against the mesh screen.

Bloodshot, watching him.

The words died in his throat. He cleared it, and tried again. "Let me out." Whoever it was on the other side kept silent now, but did not break eye contact. Still holding the handle of the door down as if opening it, he turned away and threw his fist hard against it, banging on the wooden fixture. He hated the idea of being watched so closely as he struggled. The eye on the other side of the mesh added an extra layer of perceived urgency to the situation, feeling as if the unresponsive second party were scrutinizing his attempts to leave. It made his skin crawl.

In his distracted state, he didn't realise the water pooling beneath him until it had reached over his boots and begun to soak into the legs of his jeans, which now stuck to his skin. Startled, he yelped and glanced down. The water was cold and rising quickly. Why the hell is there water? Murdoc stepped back, looking for the source, but could find no crack or crevice to cite the culprit. The water was up to his knees now. The eye had disappeared. Murdoc, calling out to his bandmates, faced the mesh and pressed his back against the opposing wall, using it to brace himself as he put as much power as he could muster into kicking in the mesh panel. It was thick, and it bent, but it held fast. He kicked at it until the surrounding fixture that held it in place began to splinter, but he stopped when the water started to reach his waist. He realised then that the clear liquid was reaching through the metal grate that separated the two rooms, and it stayed level. It was filling both rooms at the same time, which meant that both rooms were also sealed shut. It would be of no use to try and get through. The water was now up to his chest. He slammed a fist against the mesh and shouted. Whoever it had been on the other side of the confessional seemed to have left, but in order to have done so they would have needed to let some of the water out.

He puzzled on this for a moment before he felt a hand at the back of his scalp. It grabbed a fistful of his hair and yanked, hard, so that he was dragged down and backwards. The water sealed over his face, entombing him. The unexpected touch and the force of the movement caused him to gasp in sudden shock, a move which subsequently punished him with mouthfuls of water.

The water was salty.

He coughed and sputtered as he instinctively tried to gasp down hopeless breaths, but all that did was force more water into his lungs. All the while, he was still being held down by that unseen force. Thrashing wildly, he fought to get free of the anonymous assailant and free of the confines of the confessional. He was starting to grow weak, though. The water was heavy and suffocating. It was suffocating. He couldn't find the surface. The small room was full. It was full of water. The water tasted salty. Through his blurry vision, he could almost make out a figure in front of him. It reached out and took his face in both hands. The touch burned like hot steam. He winced. He cried out, bubbles rising from his lips and up to the ceiling. Bloodshot eyes. She was speaking to him but he couldn't understand it.

In the moment directly preceding what would have been his passing over into unconsciousness, the room cleared just as suddenly as it had filled. Murdoc doubled over, gasping and heaving, trying to clear his lungs, but there was no water. It was as if the room had never flooded. He took a moment to regain his composure, and then tried the door handle. He put too much force into the motion and stumbled out as the door swung open with ease. Outside. His bandmates were there just in time to catch Murdoc's graceful exit of the confessional.

Russel raised an eyebrow. "What were you doing in there?"

This gave Murdoc pause. He knew his bandmates already thought he was insane, but he also desperately craved their validation and their acceptance. He knew that attempting to explain what he had just experienced in that confessional booth would be precisely the way to garner neither of those things. They definitely wouldn't believe him. They wouldn't even bother listening to him. Well, maybe 2-D would, but he was an idiot. It didn't count. No, he'd rather not even try to explain it.

Swallowing his shock, he choked out, "Thought it was the loo."

That got Russel shaking his head, but he seemed to accept it as an answer. 2-D was staring at Murdoc, though. He was, wasn't he? It was hard to tell, with his eyes. They had long since faded to a white, but were just as hard to read as they had been since the day Murdoc had given him his iconic 8-ball fractures. Bloodshot eyes. Murdoc could have shuddered.

"What's happened to your face?"

Murdoc quickly reached a hand up towards his cheek, feeling the residual warmth of a burn grace his fingers before he'd even touched the skin. He hadn't even realised that it still hurt. Now that he had been reminded of it though, it stung terribly. In answer to 2-D's question, he could only shrug lamely. Before he could think of a more acceptable response, Noodle, without looking up from her phone, suggested they go get dinner.

"I'm done poking around tired old places for today," she said.

2-D and Russel seemed to agree, and, now completely distracted, the four of them made their way back to the car. As his bandmates threw around suggestions on where to eat, Murdoc did not look back. It felt to him as though something were watching him leave.

xxx

Murdoc idly reached a hand up towards his cheek, running his fingers over the tender skin. It had been a week, and the burns had begun to heal. If it weren't for the aching reminder, he'd be inclined to pass the strange encounter off as having been a dream, but soon enough he supposed he could convince himself that it had been nothing but a product of his imagination. Or perhaps, more pleasantly, just forget about the encounter altogether.

After they had returned home that night - they'd had burgers - Murdoc had locked himself away and cried bitterly. As much as it frustrated him, he couldn't help that he found himself doing that quite often as of late. He felt increasingly distant from the band. It felt to him as though the other three had slowly realised there were many things they'd prefer doing outside of his company, and suddenly acted on it. He'd never felt so isolated, especially since the occasion where they had left him behind for an entire day while they'd gone out to shoot a music video with out him. Every interaction with his bandmates since then had been shadowed by that one event, quietly in the back of his mind, scratching and gnawing away. He desperately wanted to be in the loop when it came to the things his bandmates were doing, and they seemed determined to leave him out. In his desperation, he'd made it so much worse by injecting 2-D with truth serum, and right after his singer had extended a gesture of goodwill by offering to spend time with him. Russel and Noodle had concluded the worst immediately. He'd distanced himself yet again due to his own selfish actions, when the only thing he'd ever wanted was to be part of their group. It didn't help that he felt like he had to keep the other night's encounter to himself.

And there was something about it that nagged at him. Some kind of itch that he couldn't quite scratch, a scab that wouldn't be picked off. He had this strange sense that he'd recognised who it had been on the other side of that confessional, but for the life of him he could not place it. He had been running faces and voices through his mind in the week since, hoping for that eureka moment, but nothing had clicked thus far. And unable to discuss it with anyone, to get a second opinion on the matter, the whole thing was driving him crazy.

Desperate to take his mind off of the encounter for a moment - and, perhaps, desperate to simulate some feeling of acceptance within the group - Murdoc had asked 2-D if they could watch one of the singer's plethora of zombie flicks, the genre which cataclysmically divided their otherwise mutual enjoyment of horror movies. 2-D couldn't have been happier to oblige, and as Murdoc sat at the opposite end of the sofa from his bandmate and alleged friend, he couldn't have felt lonelier. He watched 2-D more than he watched the film - repetitive and mundane. He couldn't tell whether 2-D had shown him this one once before, or if it was just the uninspired nature of zombie movie plot beats that made it feel so familiar to him. Murdoc rested his chin in the palm of his hand, gingerly avoiding the burns along his jaw and cheek. It was quite late, some hours past midnight, but he hadn't been sleeping very well - except for those nights where he cried himself to the point of exhaustion. He may have dozed off here and there during the course of the movie.

Once the credits rolled, he moved to stand, intending to try to salvage what was left of a night's rest. He felt no different than before he and his supposed friend had spent this hour and a half together, except perhaps he might have somehow felt even worse. The distance between them was undeniable and palpable, and while the weight of it crushed Murdoc, he wasn't sure whether 2-D even knew it existed. Unreadable, probably because there was nothing going on in there.

Before he could mutter a criticism about the movie, or maybe just forego it all with a concise G'night, 2-D spoke up.

"You alright, Murdoc?"

He hesitated. This was unfamiliar territory for Murdoc Niccals. Carefully, cautiously, he regarded his bandmate. While he may have had his unkind moments, 2-D had always been genuine. In their earlier years, 2-D had taken to Murdoc's influence and it had warped his natural innocence. While generally a well-meaning person, 2-D had said and done things to, at first, garner Murdocs's approval, and later, to make himself appear tougher in the face of Murdoc's unrelenting belittlement and mistreatment. All the while, 2-D had never truly meant any harm. He couldn't understand what it meant to willingly wish harm upon another person. Murdoc, on the other hand, had tasted it well, and couldn't understand that a person could exist without that bitterness. In his mind Murdoc analyzed 2-D's question like it was the film over a ticket and he was trying to scratch it away to reveal its underlying motive. He searched for what it was that 2-D had to gain from asking such a treacherous question, from trying to lure Murdoc into answering it.

"Fine," he finally replied, flatly. Pinpricks in the corners of his eyes again. It was getting quite late. Maybe he'd just sleep on the couch. How many nights would that make?

"Alright. I just ask, 'cause you seem a little... off." 2-D looked thoughtfully at the television. "Did you like the movie?"

Murdoc hummed a non-committal response. He'd asked to spend this time, so as a courtesy he wasn't going to immediately tear into 2-D's most favourite genre. But he also couldn't lie and say that he thought it was any good. "It was alright."

2-D nodded, seemingly satisfied with this answer. "And you know we're friends, right?"

That one made Murdoc pause. He thought about his answer for a long time.

"If you say so."

Murdoc willed away the rearing sensation of bitter tears forming again. He stared down into his lap and played absently with the hem of his sleeve, feeling at once all too vulnerable. There was a short lapse before 2-D spoke up again, and it felt to Murdoc like an eternity.

"Murdoc, you don't have to tell me what's going on, but I know something's been bothering you. If you need anything, you can ask." It was all he had to say, and it was direct, and it was honest. Contrary to Murdoc's staunch belief in the quiet, stewing hate of the human consciousness, once everything else had been scratched away, this was what had been at the heart of 2-D's first question.

2-D knew his bassist well enough to not expect a genuine answer immediately. He got up from the couch and bid the other man goodnight, leaving him with that gesture of goodwill. Although they hadn't been sitting near each other, it was suddenly much colder without his presence.

Murdoc turned aside and thought about what it was that he'd genuinely like to ask of this person that he'd known, lived with, and worked with for so many years. Some help? Some space? Was it forgiveness? If you need anything. What did he need, and what did he want?

He spent the rest of the night falling in and out of sleep on the couch. He dreamt of Plastic Beach.

xxx

One and a half weeks since the initial encounter, and the burns didn't sting nearly as much as Murdoc's pride. He knew he had made a fool of himself, and it wasn't exactly just for the fact that he had spent half the night with his face in a toilet.

An awards show, there with nominations for their previous album. An album Murdoc hadn't been present for the production of. An album his band created entirely without him. An album that reminded him that his band didn't need him. And if they didn't need him for the music, they would discard him, because he had nothing else to offer them. He'd insisted on going with them. Murdoc had started drinking before they'd even left the studio.

At the venue, he'd drifted from bandmate to bandmate as they mingled with the other attendees, before sinking quietly into the shadows in the realization that he could have been anywhere else at all and it wouldn't have mattered. No one was interested in his contribution, because he hadn't made any. This was his band's album, not his. He wanted to cling to them, to not be forgotten, to not be left behind, but they were moving so quickly. He realized all too late that he had made a mistake, and he should have just been content to stay at home while the others celebrated their success. Should have wandered alone the same way he'd done when they'd filmed that video. But how could he? He still felt the sting of betrayal when he thought about that album. It didn't matter that Russel or Noodle could have argued the same thing about Plastic Beach. Murdoc had created this band. It was his band. He wasn't just the bassist. He was the manager, the producer, the songwriter. He couldn't understand how he could have been put aside so easily. He'd thought himself invaluable, integral to the band's brand and sound, but evidently it could do just fine without him. Lost in these thoughts, and watching the night pass by without him, he drank. He drank until he was sick.

After that, he was watching the night pass by through the slit between a toilet stall door and its frame. Stomach churning, vision blurry, head spinning, he was sober enough to realize that he was an idiot. Sitting to the side of the toilet, he rested his arm against the porcelain of the seat, and his forehead against his arm. Dignified, to say the least. It wasn't often that he ended up so ill from his alcohol intake, but long since the production of Plastic Beach, Murdoc had cut back on drinking as heavily as he once had. He supposed that now he just wasn't as used to it anymore. The thought at once both comforted and dismayed him. He'd hoped that being more or less sober was enough to stop him spiralling into behaviours that adversely affected the people around him, but he was still incapable of shaking it altogether. The incident with 2-D and the truth serum was enough proof. Why did he keep doing shit like that? What was wrong with him? Why had he insisted on coming tonight?

A knock on the toilet stall door interrupted his double-feature of self-loathing and self-pity. From the heaviness of the sound, he knew it was Russel's strong hand.

"What?"

"Come on out, man."

Murdoc moved to lift his head, and was immediately overtaken by a dizzying nausea. He groaned in contention, before heaving heavily into the toilet. Outside, Russel had gone quiet, but Murdoc could almost hear him making a face at the sound. There was a long pause, and Murdoc wondered whether his drummer was deciding to just call it quits and leave him there in the stall to wallow in his own misery. Can't blame him.

"Alright, let me in then?" It sounded like more of a suggestion, spoken in Russel's usual gentle, but commanding tone. With a little extra effort needed to stop himself from spiralling back into uncontrollable nausea, Murdoc reached up and flicked the lock, letting Russel take over to push the door open. Seeing the state of him, Russel didn't seem at all surprised. "You look like crap."

"Mm. Cheers."

There was no way that they'd both fit in the cramped stall, so Russel hovered somewhat awkwardly right there in the doorway. Murdoc briefly wondered why Russel had decided to retrieve him. This was usually a task passed over to 2-D, if it had to be anyone at all. In all their years, Russel and Murdoc had had the most to argue about between them. Both strong personalities on opposing ends of the spectrum, they clashed consistently, and Russel had made it no secret that he could very much do without Murdoc's company. Russel did not have the veil of stupidity that 2-D was so graciously afforded, which let 2-D forgive and maintain a friendship with Murdoc time, and time, and time, and time again. Russel, fiercely loyal, took Murdoc's aggression towards 2-D very seriously, and that was often the catalyst for their conflicts. Beyond that, Russel just found Murdoc annoying and unlikeable at the best of times. Despite this, though, Russel was observant, and he probably knew their bassist better than anyone else in the band did. He approached him like he was approaching a wounded animal.

"You win any awards?" Murdoc asked, trying to sound as though it didn't bother him. Russel eyed him carefully.

"We got a couple." We. You, too. Murdoc could see it in his face, that he was giving him this courtesy. Russel sighed. "Mudz..."

"Don't."

"Mudz," Russel tried again. Only Russel called him Mudz. "Making an album without you doesn't mean we've kicked you out of the band."

Murdoc huffed and looked away. He didn't want to talk about it. He didn't want to draw attention to it. He wanted to ignore it, and pretend that everything was still the same as it had been in their first few years, during the development and success of their self-titled album. Where everything was still new, and no one quite knew him just yet. Where he could put on his persona and play God. Russel squatted down beside him, and Murdoc glared up at him through his fringe, face partly turned away. It would be mortifying to think that Russel would noticed he'd been crying. Russel, to his credit, didn't bring it up. He reached out and placed a hand on Murdoc's shoulder. Truce.

The drive home was quiet, save for the murmuring of the car radio at low volume. Murdoc complained of the cold and Russel offered him his jacket, warning, "Just don't puke on it." He didn't seem all that annoyed.

xxx

Murdoc was having trouble sleeping. Not only was it that his dreams lately had seemed intent on making him miserable, but he was a side sleeper, and the burns to his face, almost two weeks on, still made it difficult to lay comfortably. Instead, he was up in the studio, busying himself with work on the band's upcoming album. It was all he really knew to do. He plucked idly at the bass in his lap, figuring out how he wanted the next track to sound. He never wrote anything down. He just remembered it, recorded it, and that was it. This was the closest thing to therapy that he would touch.

Beside him, someone quietly set down a cup of tea. He turned to see who it was.

"What're you still doing up?"

"I could ask you the same question," Noodle teased. She had her own cup clutched in her hands. "What are you working on?"

"Nothing, really," Murdoc sighed, running a hand over his face. He put the bass aside. Looking at him, Noodle was suddenly aware of just how much he'd aged. She'd been playfully calling him an old man since he was thirty-five, but it was just now that she really saw it in him, tired and burdened. That realization gave her a brief pang of sadness. She would never admit the thought, but he was, unfortunately, the closest thing she had that resembled a father figure. He was like a deadbeat dad, except he was actually there, and somehow he still sucked. Not that he had ever been cruel to her - in fact, she was pretty sure that she was his favourite - but she would never be able to get past how he had treated 2-D. She'd never be able to see past how selfish and vicious he was. She thought about how awful of a person she knew he was, and that pang of sadness flickered, but it still settled in a quiet little spot in her stomach.

Murdoc did think of her as a daughter. Sort of. He'd never regarded himself father material, especially considering what kind of a father he'd come from, and for the most part that was a fair assessment. He was too immature and irresponsible for that kind of thing. She was lucky she'd had Russel and 2-D to do most of the work. When she'd been a kid, it had been easier. He'd more or less figured out how to deal with her then. It was difficult to watch her grow up. As she'd gotten older and more observant, she stopped seeing his outlandish behaviour as entertaining, and started seeing how destructive he really was. They were two very different people, and the years just seemed to push them further apart. He barely spent time with her now. What would he ever even be able to say to her?

It seemed that neither of them knew what to say. They didn't have anything to talk about. They had everything to talk about. Noodle offered a half-smile. If they worked on it, they might be able to have a real conversation one day. Noodle didn't hold out hope. Murdoc wasn't that kind of person.

"Don't stay up too late," she cautioned, retreating into the doorway. "Old people need to sleep more. Goodnight."

"G'night," Murdoc called, but she was already gone. The tea she'd left him was going cold.

xxx

As a child, Murdoc had never been taught how to swim. He could recall a distinct memory from when he was about twelve years old, his older brother scooping him out of a river. You know you can't swim. As if he had chosen to fall in. It was a skill that even now, in his later years, he was only familiar with the very basics of. How to tread water and keep your head above the surface. Paddling around. That kind of thing. He was not a particularly graceful or strong swimmer, and to an onlooker, it may have seemed like he was just thrashing about. Maybe as if he were drowning. He wasn't afraid, and didn't necessarily avoid the water - in fact, he quite enjoyed it - but he was, truth be told, a little embarrassed by his lack of aptitude for what seemed like such a fundamental skill. Three weeks since he had received them, he barely felt the salt in the air brush against what remained of the burns as he watched the waves roll in and out.

He hadn't bothered with the ocean since Plastic Beach. He'd gotten plenty of it there to last him a lifetime. But his bandmates had decided it had been long enough, it was good weather for it, and it would be nice to get out. To Murdoc's surprise, he was intentionally invited. That wasn't an offer he was willing to refuse, even though he didn't feel much like swimming that day. Sitting on the edge of the shore, out of place dressed in his usual jeans and boots, he watched over their belongings as the rest of the band made the most of the afternoon. He realised all too late that they seemed to have moved past that chapter much quicker than he had. Even 2-D seemed to deal just fine. He supposed he should have been relieved by it, but it only served to remind him of how painful the chasm of loneliness that he'd excavated for himself was. He wondered when he'd be allowed to move past it. The answer was whenever he'd allow himself to. If Hell was supposed to be separation from God, this was his own personal variation. Separation from humanity.

He trained his gaze back across to the ocean. Its deceptive calmness was as captivating as it was intimidating. Lulled into some dull sense of serenity, he was confused when he noticed a figure far off on the horizon. He flicked his eyes towards his bandmates, and then back towards the figure, and it was still there. No one else had seemed to notice it. He stood and brushed the sand off of his jeans, trying to get a better look at it. He lifted a hand to shade his narrowed eyes. It definitely looked like someone was standing there, way out in the ocean. Maybe they were standing on a rock. Maybe they were surfing. Despite the rational thoughts, Murdoc found himself compelled by it, drawn to it. It didn't look to him like a regular beachgoer. He moved in closer, trying to discern anything about its features. It seemed to have this hold on his attention. He couldn't make out any details. It was as if the figure was completely shrouded in darkness. He moved in closer, closer, so close the waves touched the tip of his boot. Still, then, he moved in closer. The entire time, he watched the figure. It didn't seem to move a muscle, just kept completely still as he came in closer. He was a fair way into the shallows, now, jeans soaked up to the knee, as he watched it seem to remain just as distant as it first had when he'd noticed it on the shore. The figure turned its head sharply.

Bloodshot eyes.

Before Murdoc could recoil, a hand on his forehead pushed him down into the clear, serene abyss. It burned. The water seemed so much deeper than it had when he was standing in it. In his shock, he could only exhale, releasing what little air he had almost immediately. He could barely think straight. This was different to the confessional. This was real. He was going to drown.

He thought about his bandmates. He thought about everything he'd put them through. He thought about every time he could have been a different person. He wished he could call them friends.

She held him in place and down below the water as she spoke, and he heard her clearly this time.

"I absolve you of your sins." He didn't get the chance to fight back.

He felt something hook under his arms and wrap around his chest, hoisting him up, and in the haze brought on by the lack of oxygen, he was reminded of the incident in the river when he was twelve. His foggy brain put the mismatched pieces where they didn't fit, and he concluded that the person pulling him from the water was, somehow, his older brother. Relief.

The ocean doesn't want me today, he thought. Darkness.

As he slowly faded back into consciousness, the first thing to return to him was his hearing. Muffled, but there all the same. Voices around him drifted in and out.

"...shallow...?"

"...felt like something grabbed him."

"A whale?"

"Whales don't eat people."

"Nah, like something was... I dunno, holding him down?"

"Oh, like a shark?"

"No, 2-D..."

Murdoc felt something strike his chest, and the force of it made him sit up, spluttering and hacking. He coughed out mouthfuls of water before he was finally able to gasp down a few merciful breaths. Someone's hand was on his back, gently soothing down the length of his spine. He felt someone else gingerly brush away his fringe, inspecting the fresh burn across his forehead. He forced open his bleary eyes, and through the fog of the salty water he saw the faces of his bandmates, crowding him, watching on in expressions he had never before seen directed towards him. From anyone.

They were worried about him. The thought caught him completely off-guard. Blinking his vision free of salt water, he touched his hand to the edge of the burn on his forehead. It stung fiercly. He winced, and Russel reached out and drew Murdoc's hand away. Gentle, but firm.

"Why didn't you take your shoes off if you were going for a swim?" 2-D asked, incredulous. His pale eyes were wide, and he had a hand on Murdoc's upper arm. The question didn't make any sense to Murdoc, whose brain was still trying to kick itself back into gear.

"Did you hit your head?" Noodle asked, gesturing to the burn. She seemed collected, but her cool exterior was betrayed by the way she inspected the injury. It only looked like a red mark, and there was no reason for him to have sustained a burn in the time he had been underwater, so it made sense that that was their assumption. Murdoc didn't know what to say. He was still coming out of the haze that engulfed what he'd just experienced, and even if he had been of completely sound mind, he would have no idea how to begin to explain what had happened. Moreover, he was distracted as he finally realized why the figure had seemed so familiar to him.

She'd been there on Plastic Beach.

He was spiralling into despair now. Why would The Evangelist be here, now, after all this time? Did that mean The Boogieman was also close at hand? He couldn't snuff out the terror that was now rising in his throat and making his stomach clench. He was so stupid for everything he'd ever done to lead him to this moment. Every stupid, drunken, fame-driven decision he'd ever made was whirling through his mind. Not one thing he'd ever done had been thought through objectively. He'd always, always make the wrong decision. His judgement was far more than clouded. It was a hurricane.

"Why's she here...?" He murmured, and the band exchanged concerned looks.

"Okay, he's definitely hit his head."

He moved to stand, and at once all three urged him to sit back down. "She's... The Evangelist..." he tried, but he couldn't get the words out in a way that made sense to his bandmates. None of them knew what he knew.

In his fear, frustration, and his overwhelming shock at the culmination of the events he had experienced in the past few weeks, Murdoc started to cry.

He'd spent so long trying to outrun his past, the thought that it had finally caught up to him was utterly devastating. He drew his knees in and sobbed pathetically. The last thing he'd wanted was for any of the band to see him this way - let alone all three of them at once - but he couldn't hold on to it any longer. The guilt and shame of Plastic Beach, the fear of the miserable end he'd carved out for himself, the nights spent in tears on the couch. All of it alone. He felt so overwhelmingly alone. He couldn't think. He couldn't speak. He couldn't ask them to understand. He couldn't ask them to forgive him. He couldn't ask to be accepted.

Russel acted first, gathering their bassist into a firm hug. Murdoc shook his head and tried to pull away, but Russel was strong, and held him steady. 2-D immediately piled on, long, skinny arms wrapping around the both of them. He coaxed Noodle into joining, until she finally rested her head on Murdoc's shoulder. They probably looked so strange there at the edge of the shore. But then, they were a strange group. They were a mismatched, dysfunctional, disjointed family. That was the best word for it, wasn't it?

It was a long time, but after he'd taken the time to calm down, Murdoc finally spoke up.

"Could you..." His voice came out shakier than he'd wanted. He cleared his throat and tried again. "Could you lot, um, show me one of the portals sometime?"

That seemed to break through the gravity of the moment, and, although smiling, the other three couldn't help but groan. Russel was laughing.

"That's what you're thinking about right now?"

It wasn't. What Murdoc was actually thinking was, I'd like to be a part of the group now. But he wasn't ready to say it quite like that. This would just have to do for now.