Chapter Text
There's an unfamiliar, oddly-shaped shadow at the end of the hallway when Seven heads for his lab that morning. Nothing is ever out of place here. Someone always notices and cleans it up. But when Seven looks around, there are no cameras trained on the spot. Curious, he walks closer.
The man's face is pink and slack-jawed, his eyes partly opened, ice forming on his body where it's slumped against the wall. Seven draws away from it, feeling guilt and revulsion and unable to stop staring at that face. The dead man's been frothing at the mouth—an effect of the poison that killed him. It's dried on his chin, fallen on the floor.
Seven dislikes Six. Six fidgets, has watery eyes, can't even meet his equals' faces. Seven has said many times that he doesn't know what Six is doing in the field, or even doing as a Silver.
Naturally, the distorted face is Six's.
Atsuki and Black stood before the door, a predatory glint in the former's eyes. "Finally," the larger man said, letting a grin not unlike his Navi's spread across his face. "I've been looking forward to this."
Black gave a single nod, his face emotionless. "Let's go."
Atsuki slipped on an insulated glove, then reached for the doorway—neither of them planned on falling to someone as insignificant as their "Boss." The door swung open, and an old security robot burst out at them. Black stepped aside and let Atsuki—closer, since the door opened inward—snap the cluster of metal and wires that lead from its main body to its head, causing the optic sensors and most of its intelligence to drop out. Its legs stumbled around blindly, but it wasn't going to be finding them any time soon. The two men slipped past it and into the inner sanctum. Black drew his gun and pointed it straight at the ridiculous, flashy chair, a few feet below the top of the seat.
"Don't move, Mister Obihiro," he advised, the Ameroupian title flowing easily from his lips after years of practice.
"Black?" came a voice from behind the chair, its pitch rising and giving away the owner's fear–and his age; Shun was only fourteen. Not much older than Black himself had been when he’d been recruited. “You lied to me!”
"Black? Who's Black?" asked the agent. "I'm the Seventh Member of Darkland’s Silver Division. I have no name." It wasn't Seven the boy had to worry about, anyway. Three was inching closer until he was at the side of the chair, his gun rising up in half a second. Seven began to close the gap at the same time Three did, coming around the other side so they boxed their target in.
"You got past the security robot," the no-longer-a-Boss stammered, eyes wide. "How—“
"Robots like that only work on children," Three said mockingly. "And a crime boss like you... I'm sure you've heard the rumors."
"No, I don't think he has," Seven replied dully. "People whispering about us tend to wind up dead." Three stepped closer, pressing the gun to his target's temple. He wouldn't shoot—killing wasn't the point of this, so he’d left the safety on—but it certainly worked as an intimidation tactic.
Three put one large hand over an arm covered by the target's purple hoodie, holding it down. Seven fleetingly hoped the boy wasn't attached to his clothes, since he would never see them again. The smaller agent exchanged his firearm for a syringe; with practiced ease, he pricked the target's neck and pushed down to deliver the knockout drug to his bloodstream.
"These are your last moments as Shun Obihiro," Seven said, almost to himself. The ex-boss's eyelids were starting to get heavy already. "Cherish them."
It's guilt that Seven feels when the General shows up and demands to know what's got his attention. Guilt when a pair of soldiers come to take the corpse away. The foamy saliva on the floor is starting to freeze there, but then a servant pushes past him to clean up all that's left of Six. When the General orders him back to work, he does as he's told mindlessly, that horrible face still burned into his brain.
Six used the pill rather than carry out his orders. Six is a better person than Seven. That's what makes him feel guiltiest of all.
The packet landed on Seven's temporary desk with a solid thump. "New orders," Three explained. "Just received them."
Seven frowned. For them to be paper, that usually meant a Darklish soldier had handed them to Three. And there would only be one reason for more soldiers to have arrived.
Sure enough, Seven read through to discover that the plan had expanded. He had more backup and some new targets. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he'd known it was coming—they either knew too much or had interfered one time too many—but knowing it and seeing it actually arrive were two very different things.
"Very good," he said. His voice didn't waver a bit, a testament to the control he'd learned.
"I can't wait to see them defeated," said Three with a nasty grin. "After all the shit they've put us through..."
"Yes. Dealing with them like this will keep them out of the way. But the boy..."
"Even I have to admit, he learns pretty fast and we could use a new field agent. And we don't have a specialized technician in the Silvers." Three looked down at his partner. "You really have grown soft, haven't you?"
"Perhaps. I think returning to base might do me some good," Seven said. He just wanted to deal with this the only way he knew how—forget it as soon as possible. It was only worse knowing it was his own fault; just like he'd seen it coming as time went on, he'd known the risks of coming here in the first place. He'd known he was no field agent from the beginning. But he never would have refused the offer to take this mission. All he'd wanted was to escape the windowless corridors of his home, even if just for a little while. He'd never even considered what would happen if all the risks turned into realities. They had now, and it was too late to do anything about it. "But until then, I won't trip up."
Three smirked. "Of course not. You never would." He ran a finger along the edge of the desk. "Yumi's gone."
The shock of having something not go according to plan brought Seven out of his reverie. "Gone? What does that mean?"
"Probably ran like the second-rate coward she is. I doubt she'll be causing us any trouble."
"But the General wanted us to terminate her—“
"We've got one body to show him. He'll be appeased." Seven didn’t think so. Three’s hands slid over Seven’s forearms, staying there for a moment to let Seven know that they meant no harm. He watched them slowly move up his arms to gently rub his shoulders. “It's my fault. If the General's mad, he'll be mad at me. You've done well," Three said into Seven's ear, almost down to a whisper. “It's in the bag. Now, relax."
When Three shows up that afternoon, he thinks it's just another one of the field agent's usual visits and promptly unburdens himself. Why else would Three be there? "I didn't think... I always said Six couldn’t hack it here, but I didn't mean it like that! I didn't know—“
"Six is dead; that is the beginning and end of it." In steps the General. Seven's eye widens in horror, and his gaze shoots down to the old man's boots. "Six is dead, but the Ameroupe situation cannot wait for Eight's return. I need someone who will do as he's told. Someone who can ‘hack it here’. More importantly, someone who already knows about the situation and what must be done. Three happened to suggest your name."
Three ruffles Seven's hair. Seven looks up at him, still avoiding the General's face. "Congratulations."
"This isn't happening..."
Seven was alone, with nothing left to distract him from what he was about to do. "This can't happen... I can't do this. I can't..."
There was no running from the Silver Division, or its mother army of Darkland. Everyone who came into contact with it knew that. But now—for the first time since he'd realized that—he almost wanted to try. He wanted to run to the Ministry and warn them about everything. The original plan, the new targets... It was only going to get worse from here, and he knew it. But at least they'd be alive this way. If Seven ran, they would just all die together, and he would be punished severely. He put his legs up on the seat and tucked into a ball. All he wanted to do was forget the world. He lifted his head to look through the drawers, remembering Shun's wineglasses...
As soon as he'd found it, he dropped the plastic bottle to the ground in disgust. It was cherry soda.
“If y’can’t, then don’t.”
“You make it sound so easy,” Seven said dully.
“It ain’t. I know it ain’t,” Punk replied. “I’ve been around the block more times than I’d like t’admit. I know we’re gonna be runnin’ from this forever if you stop a force so powerful.” Punk’s little hologram materialized next to Seven’s face. “But I also know someone like you’s gonna have a hell of a time tryin’ to live with this kinda thing.”
Seven nodded. “I can’t do this to Kaita. He...” Seven took a deep breath. Steadied himself. Faced what he knew to be the truth. “He wants to be like I was. But he isn’t. He wants to understand. But he shouldn’t.”
He would truly be on his own if he did something foolish. None of the people he’d been trying to protect could be implicated if he wanted this to mean anything… but was that so hard? It’s your fault, as always, said a voice like the General’s. It would be so easy to point all the blame onto himself, just like it had always fallen onto him down in the Citadel. Just another self-inflicted mistake, only this time it really did have to be catastrophic.
He would have no asylum, between what he’d done in Japan and what he would do to Darkland, but that was fine. He hadn’t really wanted to go back, anyway.
“These people seem real put together, huh, Black?” Punk remarked. “But they’re people. They’ve gotta have somethin’ you can dig into, somethin’ you can exploit just like a program. People’re kinda dumb like that, y’know? I’ve seen that plenty’a times, you dealin’ with idiots.”
It was a sensible argument. The kind Seven could use to justify his actions to others. The only kind anyone had time for anymore. But the one that mattered, the one that made him remember Six’s face, had already been said.
Kaita, Meiru, Enzan, Mary. They couldn’t know what this cold world he occupied was like. They didn’t deserve to rot in a dungeon cell for the rest of their lives, while the rest of the world had no idea of what they were going through. Or get left behind to wonder what had happened to their friends.
So he would make one crazy, final move. Outdo himself.
And then… well, everyone in the Silver Division had a cyanide pill just like that one Six had used. To prevent the leaking of government secrets in case of capture. Or to keep the consequences of one’s actions quick. He’d kept the necklace that concealed it stuffed in the back of his duffel for the duration of this mission. Using it had seemed unthinkable before, but the thought of it was reassuring now. He had a goal, and from there, an out. He just needed to string together what came in between.
“You know that’s not the name I had before all this, right?” he told Punk.
“It’s the only one that matters t’me. Sure beats bein’ some number or somethin’.” Punk seemed to nod to himself. “The past sucks, all right? You don’t hafta go all the way back if you don’t wanna.”
“It feels right for something like this, though.” Something completely crazy. Only a child would think this was a good idea, but here he was, going through with it. “And, besides, I kinda want to tell you…
“My name’s Netto. Hikari Netto.”