64. Scott, Virgil and John – Once

Once, there was a family brought together by love.

Once, there was a family torn apart by loss.

Once, there was a family of five brothers that became only three.

Once, there were three brothers who spent months searching every corner of the globe for their missing siblings.

Once, there were two brothers who endured the worst of tortures to protect the others and their secrets.

Once, there was a brother who didn't sleep for months, swearing not to rest until he found those who were missing.

And then he did. And then they went to reclaim what was theirs. And the brother had to break his most sacred of commandments and take a life. And it was the only way.

~oOo~

John sat at Virgil's bedside for half of three days. The other half of the days? He sat at Scott's bedside. He wasn't really living. He was just existing, really. He didn't flinch as the GDF doctors and nurses, sworn to secrecy, bustled in and out. He didn't worry when Colonel Casey ordered her troops to take over from International Rescue where they could.

Running on a minimal crew, the three unlost Tracy boys and Kayo had been strung out. The GDF would shoulder the burden for now, she had said. John had barely heard her.

After three days of endless drips and monitors that beeped and pinged in the night, Virgil was coherent enough to speak. Just about.

"How's Scott?" he asked.

John nodded, his movements agonisingly slow. He clenched his hands on his knees.

"He'll be fine," he said. "You'll both be fine."

That was not a lie. They would be fine – physically, at least. Mentally? That was a different story. For all of them.

~oOo~

After two months of recuperation, Scott was more than delighted to be pronounced fit for duty. Any more lying in bed and he would have gone insane. He'd been poked and prodded and bandaged and massaged and therapized within an inch of his life. He was fine. Fine.

Well, maybe not fine. But okay – certainly okay enough to do something useful with his time instead of watching daytime television.

He knew that Virgil felt the same way. Once, they would have revelled in the idea of an extended period away from the line of duty. Once, they thought they would never get to perform a rescue again. But now they were back and they were healing and the road was long and winding, but at least they were on it. Eventually, they would be able to look back on their ordeal at the hands of the Hood and laugh.

Maybe. Or maybe not. There wasn't much to laugh at. But at least now they were home and safe and the family was back together. More or less.

Scott stretched and felt his vertebrae pop. They weren't fully back together. But soon, he thought. Soon we will be.

~oOo~

Virgil had used his down time wisely. He'd played so much piano that his fingers ached. He'd painted so many pictures that he was running out of walls to put them on.

Some of the art didn't deserve to go on a wall, of course. Not because it was bad. Rather, because it was disturbing. Those were the sort of paintings he did alone, at night, when the demons of his mind came out to play. It wasn't the sort of thing he liked to share.

There were endless paintings of darkness. Countless paintings of yellow eyes that glinted like knives.

There were far too many pictures of uncertain shapes, pale and naked in the darkness, stripped and whipped and burnt and branded.

Once he had a big enough stockpile, he and Scott took them down to the beach and burned them. It was a grand bonfire and the flames were cleansing. With each painting they threw on, they accompanied it with a curse.

"That's for what you did to us. That's for being a fucking psycho. That's for nearly killing Scott. That's for nearly killing Virgil. That's for making John kill you."

The flames were fifteen feet high and dancing in the moonlight before they felt the catharsis they were looking for. They fell asleep on the sand together, curled up to one another like all those nights in the darkness of the cell. But this time, they were bathed in light.

~oOo~

Quite how it happened, Scott wasn't sure. But he was glad it did. Because if it hadn't, their family mightn't have been able to dodge the bullet of loss again.

He stumbled upon his brother standing on a cliff.

The worst part of it? The goddamn calm logic that was in his voice.

"An eye for an eye."

~oOo~

Once, he had been able to live with himself.

Once, he hadn't been a murderer.

But now? He was. And he didn't want to live with that.

What would his father say?

~oOo~

Call it instinct. Call it serendipity. Call it a brotherly psychic bond. Call it bullshit. Whatever it was, Virgil was glad that he heard Scott's voice in his head. Virgil, I need you!

It definitely wasn't said aloud. Definitely. But he heard it. And so Virgil found himself standing beside Scott with his hands held out as if he were facing off with a wild animal.

It wasn't a fair comparison. There was nothing wild in John's face, his body language, his tone. He was calm and collected – and about the hurl himself onto a ragged rock face.

"John, don't. Don't fucking dare. Not after everything we've been through. Not after all this."

John looked at him with flat eyes at that.

Then he turned and took a step.

He walked over to them both and then sat on the tough grass at their feet, staring at Virgil's knees.

"Okay."

And that was that.

~oOo~

Once, there was a family torn apart by loss.

Once, there was a family that was nearly torn apart again.

Once, there was a family brought together by love.

Once, there were five brothers that couldn't let each other go.

Once.

~oOo~

FIN