The beginning of his life ending started too fast for him to remember it all, at first. What he does remember comes in flashes.

Being small, six years old, almost seven, stirring noodles and having to stand on the very tips of his toes to see if they were boiling yet. She, Mommy, warmth and comfort and sadness, coming up behind him and wrapping her arms around him.

He remembers the smell of her hair and her cheek pressed up against his and dim surprise at her affection because it…..it had been a long time since she had hugged him like that.

And it should have fucking tipped him off, but he was too busy being relieved that she could hug him after all this time, and never thought to get suspicious when his mother displayed odd behavior.

He doesn't recall the knife twisting in his stomach, or it getting there, or even the pain of it, but all of a sudden he's on the faded, dirty floor of their rundown kitchen, his vision fading and her voice shaking as she shoves the blade higher, towards his heart.

"I'm sorry, baby, but you weren't supposed to exist. I can't raise a monster."

As he grows, he tells himself he forgets the feeling of his own blood soaking his hair, of trying to get up and not being able to. That he honestly can't recall air not getting into his lungs, and couldn't tell you how his breathing became a high, needy sound when she walked slowly away.

But sometimes, when he dreams, the steady click, click, click, of her heels on kitchen tile as she does so is the sound of the world breaking.

*6*

He wakes up in the infirmary of the Lab, Lerke fiddling with his IV and Crexe sitting in a chair next to him. Crexe explains, pleasantly, the whys and hows of his mother stabbing him, like it's all a rather entertaining story, not blood and scars and confusion and hurt.

"We had put out a reward for you, through all of our employees instead of just the security sector. Judging by her ramblings, I suppose she saw it and decided to rid the world of another science experiment. You're lucky someone heard the commotion and called it in. We barely got there in time." He sighed. "Such small minded thinking, honestly- "

"What do you mean, science experiment?" Six interrupts, dark hair flopping into his eyes. Nothing is making sense, his mother is gone and she hurt him and this strange man is here all he wants to do is go home.

Crexe manages to look startled for a moment, eyebrows creeping up to his hairline. "Well," he says, "this will be interesting."

*6*

They toss him into training, two days later, shoving him in a uniform beside his twin—triplet, technically, they told him, but he's an only child, and why would mommy lie?

He gets taught to run and fight and shoot, and gets beaten bloody by his brother until something inside him snaps where only he can hear.

After that, things get easier.

He grows silent, stealthy to his brothers more brutal methods. He holds his own in their sparring, and steadily begins to win. He snarls past pain and blood and anger and friendship because he will not be weak ever again. He puts enough force behind his punches to be lethal, and learns how to kill and maim using more than just his fists.

He starts to call himself Six in a gesture to his first real memory. Not of his innocence, but to remember the pain and disaster it brought, of the slow ripping of his soul as it was yanked away from him, day after day. It becomes his code name, to make things simpler, Crexe says.

The triplet is assigned the name Sevadonn soon after.

*6*

When they're about seven, Sevadonn marches up to Six and invades.

He presses into Six's space and all Six feels is a numbness, a creeping death along his spine that he gets when he's forced to hurt someone he doesn't want to.

"I am better than you," he snarls, breath hot against Six's cold face, "I will beat you and earn father's favor—"

Six cuts him off, eyes flat. "He is not our father."

"He takes care of me."

"He profits off of you."

"He's taught me everything I know."

"Which is what, exactly?" Six doesn't hesitate. "To kill and make money for ChaoSonic. That's not love, that's a job."

There's a pause for several seconds.

"He loves me." Sevadonn finally whispers, eyes wide. "He has to."

Six brushes past him. "If he loved us, he wouldn't send us to do his dirty work." Six hesitates, glancing back. "And besides," he says making eye contact with his brother, "I don't think humans can love, anyway."

Two months later, Six hauls Sevadonn out of a burning building that the soldier tasked with teaching them, a man who had taken care of them and Six knew Sevadonn looked up to, had abandoned him in. They shake hands, for a lack of knowing what else to do. Neither is used to saving people, or being saved.

Sevadonn looks at Six with the broken look he sees every day in the mirror, and they quietly become allies.

*6*

They're sent out on missions soon after they turn ten, mostly because they've finally grown enough that they won't attract attention walking alone. At least, not without a thick layer of dirt and several bones showing, like they several million orphans that already roam the streets.

They move out of the barracks but in together, mostly for training purposes. It goes, like most tings between them, unspoken that they've grown used to the feeling of having someone watch their backs.

The several million credits they each receive per mission covers far more than their basic needs, and Six finds himself spending afternoons not used by missions or training expanding his basic knowledge on mechanics, genetics, philosophy, and numerous other subjects. He finds he has a taste for fiction, but ignores it. There are far more useful things to know, things that could be life or death.

Sevadonn gets pulled into his self-education not completely by choice, but Six needs someone to bounce ideas off of, or at least hand him tools that are too far out of his reach as he repairs their security system.

One day Sevadonn looks over his brother's shoulder at the phone he's tampering with and says, "That's not traceable by ChaoSonic."

It is not a question, but it's also not asked in a place where ChaoSonic bugs were most certainly not shut down several minutes before.

Six just hums, because you never know what you'll need in the City.

*6*

They both rise through the ranks, such as secret genetic experiments can, but Sevadonn much faster. Six is happy to leave him to it, because while they don't have enemies, he found out the hard way that attention tends to lead to you getting stabbed in the back.

He also senses that it's his brother's way of distancing himself from their creators, along with his plastic surgery. Their faces had been carefully planned out to be appealing, and the change had not pleased their creators. Sevadonn finds himself more a soldier than a spy, a change that suit him. Six is just glad that he won't need to attend Crexe's parties anymore.

He has learned many things, but to how enjoy wearing a suit and making small talk are not among them.

They eventually are informed of the plan to grow the next generation, not just with slight physical upgrades but the 'optimal mindset'. Sevadonn is, unsurprisingly, looked over.

But when they ask Six to write down his entire life, his point of view, everything to be recreated for their new sister, he gives them what they want to hear, rather than what they ask to.

This idea got stuck in my head because one day I was like "Six sure makes it sound like he expects everyone to kill him for being a 'science 'experiment', so what if…" and, yeah. Oh, and Sevadonn's whole 'they love me thing' is me guessing his attitude/demeanor in the Lab is a result of him growing up only around soldiers. As a little kid, I see him being somewhat similar to Nai. Also, I see both his and Six's personalities changing with the addition of a partner in crime growing up, Six closer to what we see in RC and TT after he meets Kyntak, and Sevadonn less….cold, I suppose. You know what? No more explanations. I'll update within the week.

I REGRET NOTHING!