Chapter Text
Sunny looked down at his feet, the truth out. All of it. His feelings for Aubrey, he even admitted to seeing Kel and Hero as his family...
But even though he had spoken he had made his choice.
"Sunny?" Aubrey asks, a mix of anger in worry in her eyes as she approached him.
He sprints away before anyone can react.
"Sunny!" Basil yells, fear in his eyes. He can tell by the way Sunny was going he was heading for the roof.
"I'll get him!" Hero exclaims rushing out the door.
...
But it's to late...
The headline reads the next day, sending Basil into a panic attack, "Boy jumps from roof, rendered comatose."
Basil is shaking, the walls close in around him, despite the bright florescent lights above, the cold air in the room feels like fire in his lungs. His vision blurs around the newspaper. The words morph and change into eyes, starring back at him. They demand of him, "You really did a great job protecting him? Didn't you?"
Basil hears a distant voice calling out to him, but all he sees is that picture of Sunny, in a stretcher, bleeding heavily. Blood drips off the stretcher onto the pavement. So much red...
Just like when Mari fell...
"Basil..." a voice whispers.
Something nudges him. Basil feels like he's going to throw up. He feels hellfire in his stomach as it rises up his throat.
"Basil," a voice speaks, louder.
Something is shaking him. Something is going to hurt him. This is his fault! He's going to be killed because he deserves it! He's why Sunny had to hide the truth! Basil should have just taken the fall! It's his fault! He hung Mari! He-
"Basil!" Aubrey screams, shaking Basil with worried tears in her eyes, "Basil! I'm here! Snap out of it!"
Basil is shaking violently, his voice trembled as he asks, "What... What happened?"
Aubrey hugs him tightly, "Basil... it's..."
And she says the worst thing she can say, albiet with the best of intentions, "Everything is going to be OK..."
Basil's heart rate spikes, he tenses. He told to that to Sunny! Look to happened to him! Is this a threat!?! She's gonna kill him too! She knew it!
Basil can't breathe, his vision blurs, his lungs feel like fire...
"Doctor!" Aubrey screams desperately, "Someone! Help! He's not breathing right!..."
The doctor informs Polly over the phone, "Basil's levels of stress will kill him if they continue Ms. Polly. He experienced a mild heart attack today."
"I'm on my way," Polly replies dashing out the door, "Keep him safe. I'll figure something out."
Polly hangs up, and begins to cry. She knows Basil is dying from stress, now Sunny is in a coma, Sunny, who she knows means the world to Basil... This is killing Basil and she...
She can't lose him. She... She just can't. Not... not again.
She looks at an old photo in her wallet, she cries, as if longing for something gone, and mutters to herself, "Never. Never again..."
She closes her wallet and heads to the hospital...
Hero too struggles, but he has other, independent problems...
Hero wipes the blood off his face, starring at his reflection in the bathroom of the apartment. His eye is black and swollen, he feels sick to his stomach as he spits blood into the sink. It contrasts the white, clean material as it it washed away by the flowing water, his tears going down with it.
Why is he doing this?
He knows he isn't happy like this he knows she isn't-
There's a knock on the door. A voice asks, "Hero are you OK?"
Hero takes a deep breath, lying through a forced smile, "Of course dear, never better."
Hero exits the restroom, seeing a young woman with fair skin and long black hair. She breaks a striking resemblance to Mari, uncanny even.
"Let's go Hero," she smiles exiting.
"I..." Hero replies anxiously, "I... I'm not feeling up to dinner. Maybe some other-"
Hero flinches as she places a hand on his black eye, this gesture, which should be tender and loving, caring and comforting sends a searing pain outward from the injury. "Hero..." She speaks with a hidden harshness, "Buddy... come on. You know you worked hard to get these reservations. Are you really that selfish? Don't you wanna be my little Hero?"
Hero sighs. A part of him screams to run away, that this is wrong, but... he clings to that resemblance to Mari, and concedes, "OK... let's go..."
Finally, there is Sunny himself, comatose in a hospital bed. Kel listens to the heartbeat monitor, the sound of the heartbeat, comforting him, knowing Sunny is alive if asleep, easing his stress slightly but...
He's still crying. He asks Sunny, "Was I wrong? Was I wrong to knock that day? Sunny... I'm sorry... I just wanted my friend, my brother, back. I had no idea... I was going to forgive you. We were going to forgive you... you didn't have to do this..."
Kel collects himself and sighs, "I'm going to be here when you wake up... I promise..."
Basil gently shuts the door, having seen everything, and thinks to himself. He blames himself. He did this to them, he hung Mari, now he has to fix it. He...
He has to fix this. It's his responsibility to fix everything. Everything that he thinks he broke.
But Basil is misled. Basil is following a dangerous path of self destruction and martyrdom that will end with him in the grave, only hurting everyone more.
Basil forces a smile, his mouth feels like it's being held in place by fishhooks. He lies to himself, "Everything is going to be OK..."
Finally, there is Aubrey, who has broken down since Basil's heart attack and Sunny's suicide attempt. She loops that same song, over and over again, singing it through tears as she tries to comfort herself, "You are my sunshine... my only sunshine... you make me happy... when skies are grey..."
Aubrey is MISERABLE.
Hero is MISERABLE.
Kel is MISERABLE.
And...
Basil is STRESSED OUT.
This can only end so well, the events that are about to unfold could be tragedy or recovery from said pain, but for now...
Polly is going to check on Basil...