Chapter Text
Espio stared at the photo, every part of his body ached.
His lungs felt heavy, they always did, ever since their last case.
Espio remembered the day that picture was taken, last Christmas, when Charmy was five.
Tears stung Espio’s eyes, that day had been so wonderful, that picture was so lovely.
So why did Espio feel so much agony looking at it?
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“Espio.. ESPIO, WAKE UP!!!” Charmy yelled
Charmy shook Espio ferociously, trying to wake him up. It was Christmas morning, why wasn’t Espio waking up!!??
“Huh- Charmy what time is it..” Espio stirred awake, and tried to focus his eyes on the excitable bee in front of him.
“Uhh, it’s Christmas time, duh!!” Charmy yelped as he tried to drag Espio out of bed.
“Charmy, STOP, I'm gonna get out of bed!” Espio responded sleepily.
Espio threw the blanket off him, and got up with the least amount of ninja grace, but Charmy decided not to tell him about it.
Charmy buzzed with excitement, grabbing Espio’s arm and dragging him to their living room.
When Charmy and Espio got to the living room, Espio smiled, the Christmas decorations were truly beautiful.
Even with their lack of money, their Christmas tree was still a beauty to look at with paper decorations Charmy had drawn and lights that Vector had fished out a little extra money to buy.
“Ooooohhhh!! Espio look at the gifts, I’m gonna open all of mine right now!!” Charmy started to fly over to the Christmas tree.
“Charmy, no, you know you can’t open presents until Vector is awake.” Espio reminded him. “Awh!! But, Vector takes forever to wake up! Can’t I just shake him awake like I shook you??” Charmy questioned.
“You don’t want to wake Vector up unless there are emergencies, trust me Charmy, you don’t want a cranky croc in your hands.” Espio warned.
“Fiiinnnneeee!!” Charmy dragged out the words as if waiting about thirty minutes was the end of the world.
After a while the sound of heavy footsteps walking on their creaky floor replaced the faint buzzing on Charmy’s wings.
“Vector! You’re awake, does that mean I can open presents now!!??” Charmy squealed.
“Hold your horses kiddo, I just wanna get a picture of you two in front of the tree.” Vector said groggily.
“Awhhh, ookkkaaaay!!!” Charmy groaned.
Espio and Charmy went in front of the Christmas tree, Charmy smiled a toothy grin, the gap in his teeth making itself apparent.
“Aren’t you joining in on this, Vector?” Espio asked
“Oh, what the heck, sure I'll join you boys.” Vector said, as he clicked the camera and got in the middle of Charmy and Espio.
“Say cheese!” Vector called out.
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Why couldn’t Espio just feel happy looking at this?
People always say ‘Treasure the memories you had!’ but just thinking about Charmy made him sick.
Thinking about the silence in place of the usual chatter of Charmy, or thinking about the state Vector and Espio found him in.
Espio just wanted someone to shake him awake from this nightmare, like Charmy did on Christmas morning.
But this wasn’t a nightmare, this was real.
Charmy was gone, and he was never coming back.
Espio would never hear his brother’s laugh again, Espio would never have Charmy’s stuff on his side of the room, Espio would never see his brother grow up.
Espio put the photo back down on his bedside table, there was no use staring at it, it’s not like it made him feel any better.
In fact, that photo might’ve just made him feel worse.
Espio closed his eyes and decided to sleep through the day, he wasn’t going to miss much anyway.
“Es, are you awake?” Vector called through the door.
Espio thought about not answering Vector’s call and just pretend he was asleep, but decided against it.
“What is it, Vector? Espio sighed.
“Come and Eat.” Vector prompted.
Espio cringed at those words.
He knew he should eat, but just thinking about eating at the table next to an empty booster chair made him feel sick.
“I’m not hungry.” Espio grumbled.
“Es, just.. Come sit at the table.” Vector urged.
Espio could tell Vector wasn’t asking, he was more begging.
“Alright..” Espio relented.
Espio got up from his bed, old scales fraying off him, Espio hadn’t bothered with shedding anymore.
He walked towards the door and thrust it open.
Vector was waiting outside the door, he looked tired, angry, and sad all at the same time.
When Espio sat at the table he just stared down at the plate of food placed in front of him.
Why was he expected to eat this, why now?
Especially when they had to eat without the sound of buzzing or someone babbling about their day.
The silence was unnerving, it felt like someone was cutting off the air circulation in the agency.
“Eat up, kid.” Vector said, his voice was raspy, which probably meant he had been crying.
“I’m not hungry, Vector.” Espio sniffed, he never liked crying in front of people.
“You haven’t eaten in a few days, Es, i’m not asking.” Vector grumbled.
Espio felt his stomach twist, he hadn’t been eating because it didn’t feel right anymore.
Reluctantly, Espio held up the fork to his mouth and took a bite of the food.
The food didn’t taste bad, in fact, it was great. There was no surprise that it tasted good, Vector was a great cook.
Espio just didn’t want to eat, he wasn’t hungry.
Espio forced himself to eat a generous amount of food, he then threw the rest of it away and placed the plate in the sink, he would wash it later.
Espio then went to his bedroom, he remembered the way Vector looked at him when he went into his room.
Espio laid face first on his bed, he just wanted to go to sleep and never wake up again.
Espio wondered how this all went wrong so quickly, Charmy had only died a few weeks ago.
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The detective agency was quiet, the only sound that was apparent was the creaky walls that somehow were comforting if you got used to hearing them.
hat’s when the Chaotix phone rang.
All three of the Chaotix dashed to the phone, Vector got to it first but that’s only because he was stronger and could easily push the others out of the way.
“Hello, this is the Chaotic detective agency! Vector speaking, got a case?” Vector's voice beamed with excitement.
Espio and Charmy exchanged glances while Vector was talking on the phone, saying stuff like, “Oh yes!” Or “Of course, we’re the Chaotix after all!” Vector talked for a hot minute before he put down the phone.
“Alright boys, we got ourselves a case, we need to track down a missing girl!” Vector voice boomed with excitement, since the Chaotix hadn’t gotten a real case in a while.
The Chaotix headed into the deathtrap that is the Chaotix copter and flew over to the area where the missing girl was last reported.
The Chaotix landed nearby an abandoned warehouse, the weird part was that there were no police surrounding the area.
“Vector, don’t you think it’s weird there’s nobody here?” Espio asked.
“Ehh, maybe they just haven’t shown up yet.” Vector said, as he patted Espio on the back.
“Or maybe our client just thinks we’re so good at our job, we don’t even need police!” Charmy chirped with joy.
As the Chaotix went inside, Vector started looking over all the information the client had given them.
“Alright boys, all we gotta do is look for clues, I'm talking to you, Charmy.” Vector said.
“What! I know that!!” Charmy huffed.
“I just don’t want you getting distracted, kiddo.” Vector chuckled.
The Chaotix looked around for any sign of this missing girl. None of the Chaotix had found any clues yet, and they hadn’t even explored the whole building.
“UGHHH, Vectoorr, Espiiooo, I'm tired!!!” Charmy whined.
“Me too, kid, but detective work doesn’t take breaks!” Vector grumbled.
Espio sighed, he was tired too, so he decided to propose an idea.
“Vector, how about we split up? This is a big building, we could cover more ground if we did.” Espio stated.
“Hey, that’s not a bad idea! That’s what we’ll do, I'll take the downstairs and you two can get upstairs!” Vector beamed.
So, that’s what they did. Espio and Charmy walked up the creaky staircase, while Vector kept looking around the bottom floor.
Charmy and Espio got to the second floor and started looking around.
They looked around for about an hour, Espio had been on edge since Charmy was starting to get on his nerves.
Charmy kept talking and talking and it was so annoying!
“Essspiiooo, Can you carry me? I’m tired!!” Charmy yawned.
“NO!! Charmy, please stop talking.
We are looking for a missing girl, and I need to focus but everytime you open your mouth every thought I have in my brain just disappears!” Espio shouted, he hadn’t meant it to come out so harshly, but right now Espio didn’t even care how Charmy’s face crumbled.
“Fine, I can go look for clues myself, I don’t need your help! You’re just slowing us down because you think you’re such a good ninja, but really, you’re not!!” Charmy spat out, he stuck his tongue out at Espio.
“Fine! See if I care!” Espio snapped, he then turned away from Charmy, not caring if he left.
Charmy huffed as he then buzzed off to go find some clues, somewhere else.
Charmy flew up to the third level to look for this stupid girl, Charmy didn’t understand, if this girl was really lost here then shouldn’t she be crying and screaming for help?
Charmy shrugged it off, maybe she got her mouth ducktaped or maybe she got knocked out?
That’s when Charmy felt a hand grab his arm, he huffed.
“I’m still angry at you Espio!” Charmy shouted, then he turned around.
It wasn’t Espio.
That’s when Charmy realised, there was no missing girl.
There was no real case, it was all a ruse for a mugging.
Charmy's screams weren’t heard, since they were muffled.
Charmy got stabbed, blood seeped through Charmy’s jacket.
Charmy wanted to fight back but he couldn’t, he was going to die.
Charmy was going to die and he was going to die alone, Charmy closed his eyes as he slowly lost feeling in his small body.
Espio truly wished he could say he was thinking of his brother when he died, but he wasn’t until they found him.
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Espio felt nauseous, He felt nauseous because he had to sleep in a room with an empty child’s bed.
He felt nauseous because nobody would understand how he felt, ever.
He felt nauseous because he was forced to eat at a half empty table.
That’s when Espio couldn’t take anything anymore.
He shuffled over to the agency bathroom, grabbed his toothbrush and shoved it up his mouth, making him vomit out the contents of what little food he had eaten.
Espio flushed the toilet and laid on the cold tile floor, he started to sob until he fell asleep in the bathroom.
How could everything go so wrong so fast?