Chapter Text
Seven let his shoulders loosen up, leaning slightly back, as he began the story that led up to all this. He wasn’t sure how comfortable he was with sharing it, but he’d work it out as he went along.
“You, uh, knew me back then. I was a college student, senior year, comp-sci major, and on my off days, I’d go cause trouble,” He smiled, sheepishly, and continued softly, “I liked seeing fear on people’s faces, it was a way to feel control, and as much as I hate to admit it now, I absolutely adored the fire and the chaos. It was one big way to get back at the world that seemed to hate me from day one.”
Seven shuffled his fingers together. He wasn’t going to recall any further than he had to. Shedletsky simply stared on in the pause.
“What we haven’t chatted about was my…” Seven hesitated, “My best friend at the time, my accomplice. He went by many names, socially. He refused to pick an identity, which made it doubly hard for me to talk about him-” he put his hand towards his mouth, “Oh, I’m rambling. It doesn’t matter who he seemed to be outwardly, you wouldn’t have known him by face,” He scowled, “because he made sure that when we had the slightest hint that we might get caught, he was out of sight and out of mind. You’d know him as Noli, I think.”
Seven remembered Noli from those years in great detail. He recalled the fact that Noli barely ever let his own personal visage show, opting for large sweaters and flowing garments and gloves, some kind of hood or veil, and his mask, which Seven was relatively sure could not come off. He remembered the deep purple hues of all of the clothes he wore, the way the mask eerily mimicked his emotions and the way his lips should move, the way his locs seemed to have a glittery appearance to them, some a deep purple, others a contrasting, bleached white, seemingly at random. He fondly recalled the way Noli used to smile at him, those warm, void-filled eyes. Sometimes, it seemed as though the stars themselves were contained in the eye-holes of that mask. He wouldn’t be surprised if they were.
He remembered this Noli affectionately, from before everything got complicated, before he got cold feet. Noli had been better than any other person he’d ever met. He not only enabled Seven’s bad habit of terrorism and vandalism, but he partook in it. It was almost as if Noli and himself were the same person back then, never disagreeing or hurting each other’s feelings, just perfectly content in each other’s company. One in the same, yet only one part of the other’s whole.
Shedletsky seemed taken aback by the name, “I’m sorry, did you say your accomplice was…”
“Noli, yes. That’s the name of his you’ve heard before,” Seven looked at Shedletsky with eager eyes, knowing entirely that Shedletsky would have been shocked by his partnership with Noli.
“Noli? Like the Void-Being? How would you have even met them in the first place?" Shedletsky’s tone was almost sarcastic, as though he were in awe, in some sense, that Seven and Noli had been around each other, partners, even, "I’ve never seen the thing myself, though I’ve heard the darkest rumors about it and its surprisingly serious following.”
“Well, that’s a different story, but I guess I can tell that one too, since it’s short.” Seven smiled ever so slightly, “It was my first year in college, four years prior to what I was just going on about. I wasn’t a… particularly good student, at all, in my college years, especially in my freshman year. I understood the concepts well, I’d had a habit of breaking systems ever since I’d tinkered with my first command panel in late middle school, so getting through the program wasn’t a problem. I was typically at a party if I wasn’t at school in my freshman year, however. It’s not like I went to socialize-everyone there thought I was some nerd-freak. I didn’t care at the time, I just wanted free food and a place to cause trouble and run, if I’m being honest.
“One day, I’d found myself with some people with clearly bad intentions at the end of a party. I remember, for the first time in my life up until that point, being genuinely nervous about my lack of control over the situation. I had a suspicion that these people were a part of that silly cult, and had no idea whatsoever that Noli was even slightly real. I was under the impression that I was going to die that night, as a sacrifice to a false god.
“They’d led me to the basement of that shabby rental house that had been so lively just minutes before, the floor covered in books, only certain corners lit with sickly, purple candles spilling wax along the concrete floor. With one flick of a match to the last candle, the room was completely dark. Each candle, and the flame which lit the final one, was blown out immediately. For about five seconds, the entire room was pitch black. You could even say it looked like it was… void of light.”
Seven snickered at his comparison, while Shedletsky only rolled his eyes with a small smirk. “I remember it all so clearly,” His voice was soft, comfortable, with the smallest hint of coarseness to it from overuse, “All in one moment, I saw a flicker of light at the center of that basement. The flicker turned into a steady ray, then it morphed into what I could only describe as a tragedy mask’s left side. The frown shifted into a smile, and all at once, the light traced a person ahead of me.” He paused, staring into the fire.
“The person I’d seen was Noli, but I never processed that until a few years later. I genuinely thought the whole thing was a fever dream from passing out drunk. As soon as Noli appeared ahead of me, I apparently fainted, and when I woke up, which, might I add, was something that I did not believe would happen, somebody who appeared to be someone else was trying to help me come to my senses.
“He looked like this shorter man, about my age, wearing casual clothes with only a few star-like embellishments, mostly purple or black, with locs framing a full comedy mask which didn't quite glow like it did in our later years. He looked like a normal citizen of Robloxia, albeit with eccentric taste in facial accessories, and it fooled me.
“He was so sweet to me, asking me if I knew where I was, what I studied, if he could help me home, if anyone had bothered me or given me trouble. I wasn’t used to that kind of kindness. My parents… weren’t the best, and I’d somehow been the most unlikable kid at my various schools I went to, whether that was because we moved a lot or because I’d gotten myself into a bad reputation that distracted me from finishing schoolwork, it all depended. This was something I’d never really seen before, and at first, I was dismissive and even a bit hostile, but as he insisted on helping me home, I was too tired to have the heart to say no.”
Seven smiled, almost dreamily, at the thought of that night, his tail almost seeming to flick back and forth on a makeshift beat, “I gave him my keys, he drove my beat-up, champagne-tinted car all the way back to my dorm, and he held me steady as we went up to the building. I told him he could just leave me there, at the front door, but he insisted on bringing me up to my room.
“We took the elevator up to the fourth floor, I unlocked my dorm room door, and we both walked inside. I’m not sure how he convinced me to let him, but he stayed the night there with me. My original roommate was absent, I’m decently sure that by that point, he’d already dropped out. I think I only saw him once that entire semester. Once again, somehow, Noli had charmed me into letting him be my new roommate. I’d agreed to him before I’d ever even learned his name. At that time, I had no idea who this ‘Noli’ ever was, I had happened to be someone who was not well studied on history, so when he hesitated and told me his name in that sickly-sweet voice of his, it didn’t ring a single bell. I just thought it sounded pretty cool.
“After that, we were almost inseparable. He’d follow me around, then he’d somehow bribed someone to admit him as a formal student or manipulated the system behind my back, attempting to fit in more, which meant we were separated whenever he chose not to skip class. If I recall correctly, he was a theater major.”
Shedletsky leaned forward in his seat, “You mean to tell me that, rather than you striking some kind of deal with that malevolent force…” he mumbled, “Like I’d previously believed,” he continued, “he took a liking to you first?” Shedletsky’s eyes were wide with curiosity.
“Yes! Honestly, that’s how it went. He was very quiet and softly spoken the first few days we’d known each other. Looking back, I know it was just him attempting to appear docile to me. He had an interest in me, and not the other way around,” Seven smiled sheepishly.
“Anyway, I’ve gotten off-track. The reason I brought him up was to say that he was a big part of my life back then, the only time you wouldn’t see us together was when there was a danger of getting caught, which, coincidentally, includes each time one of the admin were called in to handle whatever situation we’d caused. One second he’d be right there…” Seven paused for a second, debating whether or not to go in detail on whatever the two of them really had back in college, “...alongside me, causing trouble hand in hand, and the next he’d whisper in my ear about how I totally got this, and in an instant, he’d disappear. That was my first clue to the fact that admin had arrived, and why you’d have never seen me with him in the first place.”
Shedletsky’s lips curled into a smile, ever so slightly, “So he was a coward, then,” When Shedletsky smiled, Seven could see his sharp, bright canines. They scared him, if only a little bit.
“Y-Yes," he started, a feeling of indignation welling up second hand, "But it was for reasons related to his cult. He still kept up appearances, unbeknownst to me, to his highest officers. He didn’t want mainstream attention, certainly not complications with more banlands issues,” Seven recalled approaching Noli about his eagerness to leave in a discontented fit the first time it happened, and he remembered the way Noli’s mask had shifted to something scared, something sorry. He remembered the apologies that he’d given, how he had some obligations outside of the two of them, and how he really knew that Seven could make it out on his own. It was the first time they’d ever disagreed on something, surprisingly, and Seven had tried to ignore the bad taste it left in his mouth on the basis of empathy.
“Anyway, we had our fun, took our courses, cheated on exams, took money, sometimes worked for it, whatever, for the next three years. Senior year was when things took a turn. We’d rarely had fights up until that point, but when the kid showed up at our doorstep, it changed everything,” Seven remembered how he’d shared a class with Noli that was early in the morning that year, some kind of twisted miracle, and they were always the first ones out of the dorm building by a long shot. Every day, in the twilit morning, they’d walk through the quiet campus to their class, the chill in the air surrounding them. They’d talk about anything, laugh about the places they’d just destroyed, the teachers they’d fooled, talk about things that they’d never had the luxury of feeling secure enough with others to talk about, about their feelings for one another, and how they could never even dream of leaving each other behind. Once, when they’d woken up rather early, he recalled the two had kissed, away from prying eyes. It was something he’d never forget.
For a split second, Seven felt his face drop at their naive optimism. They didn’t even know what was about to happen. What was about to split the two of them apart so concretely that the next time they’d speak to each other it would be one killing the other. He ran one hand over his temple, along the scar.
“This is where the ‘kid’ shows up?” Shedletsky seemed a bit stunned by the development. Seven almost laughed, deeply understanding how completely and totally unlucky the two of them were.
“Yeah. I was 22, almost 23, Noli was obviously quite a bit older, you know, god and all, but still just as inexperienced as I was when it came to things like this. We stepped outside for our commute to class, it was a chilly morning, right between Halloween and Thanksgiving, I think, and we almost completely missed the infant at the doorstep to the dormitory,” He laughed, “We just… looked at each other, and then broke out into a frenzy of nervous whispers as we tried to figure out what to do.
“Who knows who left it, but the thing was sound asleep. I’m not sure how I became the more moral of the two of us, but I distinctly recall Noli telling me to just leave it there or teleport it to somewhere no one could find it,” He sheepishly smiled, “I think I shrieked at the thought.
“I was surprisingly ok with the idea of taking it in, it was almost like I took it as no more than a joke. I was almost neutral, somewhat excited at the thought, the little baby with horns and a tail; and I didn’t know it then, but something in the little thing reminded me of myself when I was younger. I remember calling that day off, phoning in that I was sick and faking up some doctor’s note just to stay home and take care of the little guy,” He smiled warmly, faltering for a moment as he remembered Noli’s dismayed face, and the conversation they’d had as he turned to face the door.
“You can’t possibly be serious right now, Sev. You leave that thing right at the foot of the door, it’s not our problem. I’m not going to class without you.”
Seven wouldn’t face him. He wouldn’t dare. He knew the stubborn glare Noli was giving him, he knew the shining stars of his pupils were stabbing directly into the back of his head. This was where he drew the line. This was something he had to do. Maybe they’d pawn the baby off on someone else in a week, for all he cared. Regardless of what might happen, in some weird way, he knew he was responsible for this kid. At the moment they’d locked eyes, he knew he wouldn’t have had the resolve, the lack of empathy, to throw the thing in the void. He knew.
“I am serious. I’m emailing my professors and I’m gonna take care of this thing until we find someone else who can.”
“Sev, I won’t let you. I can’t let you get attached like that. You’re a 22 year-old student in debt. You are in no position to take care of this thing, even if it’s just for a day or two. You have to realize that this is an impossible task.
“Step back with me and realize what the best option for the both of you happens to be.”
Shedletsky snorted quietly, “I didn’t expect you to have so much unfounded empathy.”
Seven chuckled in return, “I didn’t expect it either. It was like I had an obligation to take the thing in. Causing trouble was my thing, but I never caused death. I couldn’t leave it just to die. Even if I’d only taken care of them for a small period of time, I’d do what I had to.” Seven messed with the hair behind his neck, twirling a small strand of hair round and round.
“By the end of the week, Noli and I were beginning to feel the friction of keeping the kid around, and I’d haphazardly dedicated myself to the idea of raising the little imp. Taking care of him was beginning to fall into my routine.
“By some miracle, not only had I passed that school year, but Noli and I had been able to remain… decently… cordial, towards one another, as each week passed, and each week I continued to look after the kid,” Seven kept telling Noli that he’d find someone else to give the kid to each week, and each week came and went. Noli just stewed on the whole ordeal, and by the time they’d graduated, they got into a gnarly fight. Even the thought made him flinch, ever so slightly. It was when he’d learned the extent of Noli’s power.
He’d had an inkling of the idea that Noli wasn’t entirely being truthful about himself for quite some time, Noli had come clean to a certain point during their freshman year when he lost a bet on one of their little destructive adventures. He mentioned that he had more powers up his sleeve, that he had people who relied on him, and that, most importantly, he wasn’t a particularly standard robloxian civilian, but that’s all he’d said, nothing more.
Seven caught on, as time went by, when the admin would show up, Noli would disappear without using his own GUI, vanishing into the ground like a dissolving shadow. He knew the mask wasn’t supposed to move on its own like it did. When they were out causing trouble, he'd commonly note that Noli's crown seemed to glow. Sometimes, Noli would stand just out of Seven’s peripherals, and if he glanced just right, he could see fractions of the figure he saw the night he was to be sacrificed, leaning down, studying him over his shoulder. The second he’d turn to get a closer look, it was just normal Noli, with a charming smile.
Seven was always meant to figure out that Noli was a deity. Had it been on nicer terms, he most likely wouldn’t have been upset at Noli for anything other than withholding it for so long, especially after they’d been so close. He probably would have liked it quite a bit.
However, as much as they came to disagree on it, he also had to assume that there was no way he couldn’t have taken C00lkidd in. He didn’t like the idea that, had he just thrown this child, the child he’d put time and effort and money into, the child that he truly loved as his own, even at that point in time when he was barely getting through college, he would still be with Noli to this day. If he were to give up C00lkidd, he would have given up his son, the person he raised and cared for, even if, in the end, it was all to a fault, he cared and loved for the child, and he would lose that forever. To lose that was to gain a lover, a person, a concept, that was so intertwined with his own being that their bond seemed to have been once in a lifetime. He had to hope that he made the right choice, that Noli was nothing to miss out on, that they were meant to part no matter what, because he knew that, in his heart, he couldn’t choose between the two. Losing Noli was just as much of a heartache as losing his own son. At this point, he’d lost both, and barely had himself.
Seven looked down. “After our graduation ceremony, Noli pulled me aside as we were clearing out our things from our dorm. I’d been considering, since I had a degree, letting go of one more thing I held dear.” he paused.
“Alright. This is the point where we have to follow through with decisions, Sev. I need to know. What are we doing with the kid?”
Seven looked up like a deer in headlights, his long hair covering his face. He swiped one side of bangs away from his eyes to give Noli the attention he deserved. He stood up, leaving the box he was packing on the floor.
“You know my stance on it. You and I both know that you'll run yourself to the ground taking care of him. It’s hindering our relationship, too. I hope you see that, I hope you see that I’ve been trying my best to avoid this being an issue.”
Seven straightened his glasses, pulling his hair back into a ponytail.
“That lack of communication, it’s pulling us apart." He paused, looking towards their window, "And, if I'm being honest, the kid isn't all of my concerns. What concerns me the most is the way you turned good."
His mask frowned, he began to pace, "When was the last time we messed up some big-shot, burned down a building, even something as mundane as pulling a prank? When do you ever have fun anymore, now that you’re concerned with some silly moral standing?”
Seven began to inhale, as though he were to speak, but Noli cut him off one last time.
“When will you loosen up a little and realize that the one who will be here for you at the end of all this is me? That this is what you are? That you’ve dedicated so much time towards a child that you picked up as a joke, when you know that leaving our old ways was never necessary, that I'll always love you and give you what you deserve?”
Seven waited to respond. “Noli, about that. Now that college is over, I… I don’t think that I can continue to exploit like we used to, at all. I want to make a better life for myself. For the kid. And the kid is staying with me, no matter what. He’s my son.”
Noli stood still in shock.
“Noli, if you’re up to it, I want you to stay with me. I want us to still be together, to raise this kid together. I want to-”
“Don’t you dare.”
“I… I still love you, Noli, I really-”
“I… I don’t know if I can believe that. You’re choosing to… everything we worked for… Everything you stood for... Everything that sewed us together, my very interest in such a mortal...”
Seven reached out towards Noli, to which Noli shied away.
“It's that easy to leave it? To change yourself? How can I be happy when you insist on taking the moral path, like you’re better than me, destroying everything we worked towards, all of our chaos, for something that you will hurt yourself trying to care for?”
The words rang out in Seven’s head. It was awful. He remembered the way Noli’s teary eyes beneath the mask shone like a supernova, he remembered the way he’d flicker, losing too much of his composure as the two began to shout, catching glimpses of the god he’d met that night, four years ago.
He remembered the hurt in Noli’s voice. The pain, the choked sobs, at the loss of his trusted other. The only person he’d ever trusted, given himself to, formed what could only be described as a bond so deep, it made him human. He’d given up his apathy, his lack of connection-he’d never be the same again, and all the same for Seven.
“It's not even that I think you're a traitor, Seven. You're trying to change yourself, trying to become someone you would hate, all over some silly kid?" He looked down, words laced with a venom, "A waste of potential. Of my love. Of my followers’ precious time.”
C00lkidd had been equally worth it, as he’d begun to think before. He’d lost the first person he’d felt at peace with, the first person he’d kissed, he’d decided to live with, he’d loved. Instead, he got to raise the most talented kid he could ever dream of and redeem himself, even with his limited funds and time. He knew either way, he’d do both of them wrong. He tried his best.
“Swap out my lover, for who was now my son, because the two couldn’t live in harmony,” his son, who had fallen into his hands by mistake, his son, who wasn’t even officially documented as such, his son, who he’d named and cared for and would never let go of. Some part of him, the day he’d first picked the infant up, knew he’d keep it forever, or as long as he could.
Seven sighed, “We fought over it. He left in a rage, and told me how I’d led him on, how we’d spoken about the fact that…” he changed the wording, “we’d both been changed from our friendship in each other, and we’d never be able to leave it without breaking each other in ways only the other could fix,” he looked down, knowing it was true, “and after he said that, he left. We didn’t see each other again all the way up until a few days ago, actually.”
“And you will be broken, without me, like a window missing a shard in the center. And that shard will be the last piece of my window, nothing more than a looking glass,” Noli held the door handle, his bags in one hand, his mask almost aflame with power, his hood down, a halo forming around his now-visible crown. Seven had tears in his eyes. He could hear c00lkidd stirring on his bed.
“I love you Seven. I always will, but the path you’ve decided to neglect me for no longer allows us to be on the same team. Giving in to my temptation that night was the worst thing I could have ever done,” and as he turned, he muttered under his breath, “And if I ever see you again, 007n7, pray that we can make up, for your sake.”
“He just… Left you alone? What startling resolve,” Shedletsky closed his eyes and sighed, impressed, “Vengeance is natural to me. For such an unpredictable god, he certainly keeps his cards close to his chest.”
“He does. He stays particularly neutral, at least,” he bit his lip, “Or, so I thought,” he muttered, continuing, “But after that point, I’d attempted to start fresh and raise the kid. I was able to score quite a few jobs, all of them barely paying the bills together, and I did my best to give him a good upbringing. He was so smart, so talented, and at points, I wondered if he would have done better if he’d been raised by someone who wasn’t an ex-terrorist. He certainly got scrutinized in school for it.”
“It frustrated me! I tried my hardest to be…” he glanced at his hands, “I tried to be someone, a role model, a changed man. Nobody saw that. They saw the unstable, cruel college kid. Even with all that, I kept trying. My son grew up to be such a wonderful young man. Took after his father, though.”
Shedletsky raised an eyebrow, “In what way, exactly? Because if it’s because-”
“Exactly the way you think. He’d steal my old equipment and cause trouble at the same damn Builder Brothers Pizza that I used to. Got me blacklisted, actually,” He laughed, remembering finding out about c00lkidd’s escapades.
“Elliot, please. You know he didn’t mean any harm! He doesn’t know what he’s getting into. We’ve worked together, this is his favorite place, just cut me some slack, please-”
Elliot’s tired eyes looked up at him as he slammed his hand on the counter. The two stood at the back of the building, in the work space, far away from the people in front. Both of them had the common decency to disagree in privacy, rather than around prying eyes.
“You have to be kidding, 007! You know I can’t let you off the hook for your kid’s actions. Lock that stupid GUI behind something, keep your old things hidden away, because he’s going to take after your example. I can’t in good faith let you come back here again. You or your son will ruin the place, just like you did almost a decade ago, and just like your son did a week back.”
He recalled all of the times he’d had to scold c00lkidd about it, how he’d had to tell him that they weren’t allowed back, and how each time, regardless of how wrong c00lkidd’s actions were, he would always feel immense guilt. They’d go out to a playground after, or get some ice cream, or play a game together, when he could afford the time. He remembered pushing him on the swings, sometimes stepping back and manipulating it to make it faster with his GUI, the sunset shining on the two of them. He remembered that c00lkidd’s favorite ice cream flavor tended to fluctuate between bubblegum and rocky road, and how, without fail, he would make a mess, even with Seven putting out many preventative measures. He recalled how good c00lkidd was at fighting games without even trying.
He remembered his son. He remembered the good, the way he’d carry him when he’d get tired, the way he’d struggle to catch up when c00lkidd started running. The way he’d soothe c00lkidd when he’d cry, or someone bullied him, remembering the way he’d get thrown to the wayside as a child.
If he weren’t so oddly detached at the moment, he would have been able to shed a tear. Unfortunately, or, perhaps fortunately, tears would not come. He breathed in, then out.
“It was at the worst point in my life after college that he went missing.” The panic, the realization, the pit in his stomach, it all flooded back to him, muted in memory, though intense nonetheless. He had already had enough of a hard time raising his kid, keeping those jobs, dealing with the fact that he got blacklisted.
Those sleepless nights, they really got to him, made him see things. He couldn’t entirely tell if it really was Noli messing with him or not, but he’d see that shadowy figure, with shining eyes, the light of the stars hanging down from his robes and his crown, like sun rays, but cold, unforgiving, icy. Sometimes, they would disappear when he would glance at them, pacing about in his room. Others, he would stare at them from his bed, hair unkempt, glasses still on, and they would stare back. The cold gaze, the depth of space within those pupils, it unnerved him. At the same time, regardless of if it was really Noli or not, it scratched open that remnant of a scab that had formed over what he recalled from the two of them, their relationship. There were a lot of issues that resurfaced with those hallucinations.
C00lkidd had been getting harder to manage the older he’d gotten. He’d recalled that they’d left things off on a good note, but that prior to c00lkidd going missing, they’d been fighting, and c00lkidd didn’t know that he was acting out of place. Not only did the guilt from fighting wash over Seven every time, the guilt that he’d raised behaviour like that made it all worse.
“He… went missing?” Shedletsky almost whispered.
A shaky exhale, “One day after school, I drove to pick him up, but he wasn’t there. I wasn’t worried, he did this often,” he smiled, fondly remembering the adventures that c00lkidd had told him of countless times before, “So I started to search the usual suspects. He wasn’t there, and I started to get nervous. Minutes of searching turned to hours, then days, then weeks.”
He glanced to the side, feeling his neck grow cold, a deep worry and distress settling in the back of his head. “I got desperate to find him. The longer it was, the less I showed up to work. The worse and worse I got.”
Shedletsky said nothing, though looked at Seven with a soft, sympathetic gaze. Something within Seven hated that, while something appreciated it, basked in it even.
“Then,” he hesitated, his voice stuck in his throat, “Then, I guess, deep down I wanted something dramatic, it was drastic measures… or my old ways,” he paused, his voice quiet, soft, “so… I went back online and terrorized, made a scene to try and get his attention, or rip everything to shreds in the process of finding him. Let’s say he wasn’t alive, it was my way of getting back at the world.
“I admit that it was fun, but that part came later, after the guilt and shame. The only thing that overrode all of that this time was my own son.” he played with a strand of hair.
“You relapsed?” Shedletsky asked, gently.
“I guess so. I was probably worse, to be honest,” He looked down, “Am worse, I suppose. This was mere days ago.”
The two paused, staring deeply at each other. Seven wove his fingers in and out of each other, finding a good way to link it all back.
“Apparently, getting that risky and forward got the attention of higher figures, and all of them I had no trouble dodging-not to brag, not in the slightest-with the exception of one, that being good, old Noli. He cornered me while I was out burning down some odd building,” he paused, looking him in the eye, “Which isn’t exactly something I do with reckless abandon, but I supposed I was in a haze and needed to feel something,” he glanced back down and continued, “and tugged me deep within the void. He didn’t even give me a chance to really talk before he…”
He paused at the thought. The despair, the numbness, knowing it was the end, even from the moment he left his place of hiding, knowing he’d either find his son or die trying, knowing his little temper tantrum disguised as a lighthouse beacon to his son were futile and wouldn’t even help himself… He hesitated, taking the feeling in again. The feeling that felt like the deep worry in your lungs when you know you did something wrong, but can’t place it, the anxiety pre-cursing another gamble, the deep worry that came with the realization that you were not unstoppable.
He sighed and continued, “...lured me in deep and stabbed me through the temple.” He giggled, something quick, more pessimistic rather than enjoyed.
“I guess he never stopped being so performative.”
The two sat in silence, before Seven quickly clarified, “So, uh, yeah, that’s- uh, how I ended up here. You ehh… you know the rest.”
Shedletsky simply stared, wide-eyed. Then, he spoke in a tone that Seven had never heard from him before, in fact, it was something that sparked some admiration in his overridden heart, made his lips curl up almost imperceptively, a bittersweet feeling that tried to take his throat down into his chest and threatened to make his cracked, burning eyes tear up.
“...Seven, I'm...” It was almost like he was trying to reach out a hand, leaning forward, "...Sorry."