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Doc
Yellow.
Doc still heard that moment. He heard it in his mind, felt it in his bones, the prickle up his skin, and he knew he’d never felt anything worse.
He’d had his arm and his eye taken.
He’d been augmented down to his bones against his will when he wasn’t even yet eighteen, still a child under some tormented, twisted version of care. Yet that hadn't been it.
Green.
That hadn't been the worst thing he’d ever felt.
Neither was it when Jimmy had gone missing for a day, only to show back up with a little blaze-born. That had been like his heart was being crushed, but that wasn’t the worst.
White.
Not even when the avians had fled them early on, throes of fear, not understanding that good things could remain. Doc understood why, he got it down to the last syllable, how they’d misconstrued that moment, and he and Etho had spent the day in a hysteria that Cleo later claimed was the most terrified and upset she’d ever seen the two of them, and this was coming from someone who’d been with them most of the rebellion.
Rebellion?
What would you even call it, by then…?
Uprising? Revolution? A full-on coup by a group of stupid teenagers who were just so sick of the world never seeming to give a singular damn about them?
But no, that wasn’t it either.
That wasn’t it.
None of those things could wake him up at 3 AM in a cold sweat, tears burning his natural eye, his archival one flashing in a sudden overload from the necessity, please, please, please…
Red.
The sound of the wooden handle of the switchblade hitting the tunnel floor was an earthquake.
The singing of the blade emerging from her augmented hand ought to have been a shattering choir, an entire chorus trying to shred Doc down to his heartstrings, play them like a harp to accompany their voices, and what were they, what was that?
The way he screamed.
The way so much blood poured between those white-furred fingers, the ones he’d been holding so adoringly only minutes before, as he’d stepped away.
Thinking I’d save him.
And how would that ever be? Doc should’ve known. Should’ve known him so much better, this other kid he’d met in the Depths, fighting over stolen glowstone dust, pulling scams and running for their lives, it had been a miserable, exhilarating, horrible, beautiful way to live, that whole year…just the two of them.
Etho had screamed. He was usually a quiet person, so hearing it had been the worst thing. Seeing it had been the worst thing. Struggling to reach him, being held back, just let me go, let me go, let me go to him, he’s hurt, there’s so much blood, there’s so much, what if he doesn’t make it, what if…
What if he died because of me?
Doc rolled over in bed.
His eyes were open but it was still pitch-dark, that’s how it worked in the under-city…the night cycle was so dark, and besides, they didn’t have any windows into their bedroom. What would be the point? There wasn’t any sun down here to let in.
He was shaking, or at least, his flesh and blood parts were, his augmented arm didn’t do the same, it couldn’t, it was for all it’s technical genius still just machine, more machine than man, and what even was a man anyway?
Was that him?
Or was he still the terrified boy who’d been torn apart by insanity, and forced to play up his own brand of mad genius just to survive?
His hand found warmth.
He grabbed Etho beneath the covers and pulled him close, clinging to him so tight that his husband awoke with a startled yelp.
“Huh…?*
He felt the shaking, and sleep-addled as he was, he immediately reacted. He rolled over himself, facing Doc beneath the pillows. His paw-pad tipped fingers reached up to cup his face in the dark. Felt the streaks of tear tracks there, and he was quick to swipe them aside.
“Hey, hey, shhh…you’re ok…I’m here.” He murmured in a soft, soothing tone.
This wasn’t a rare occurrence, per say. They both had a lot of demons. Nightmares were old friends who made occasional visits in the dark. They comforted each other through them. This was the worst one though, because it wasn’t some fear about their children gone off into the over-city, or grappling with the feeling that they’d always be somehow set apart…this wasn’t about the endless responsibility on their shoulders, both of them having given their all to a world they’d once resolved to let burn.
It didn’t matter.
As long as I have him.
And this was the worst.
Because without Etho, he’d never have had his children. The sight of Etho with the three of them all piled upon his already petite frame, looking up at him with the expression that he knew he’d done something wrong, was something he kept folded deep in his heart, for all the exasperation he still played over it all.
Without Etho, he’d never have stood up. He’d never have confronted the very place that had torn him apart. Ordered those sterile white walls studded with mosaics and painted by artists, grown over by witches moss and mushrooms. He’d never have taken the title that still haunted him to this day.
Director.
That’s who he was…but it wasn’t, not really.
Because really?
Who he was…was small, and scared, and hurt, and was a man who was much more at home making dinner with his family all gathered around the table, safely together, than whatever it was he actually did, but he had no right to that, not at the moment, and it didn’t even matter, because here, here, here…
“It was my fault.”
Etho stilled a moment in his soothing circles over Doc’s cheekbone.
“…what?”
“Your eye.”
Doc heard the small, singular intake of breath, and then Etho sighed softly.
“It’s not your fault. It was never your fault. Doc, you know that.”
“I’m sorry.”
And what was he even apologizing for? The two words, three syllables, stuck in his throat and scratched on his tongue, he didn’t understand it. It was probably more of the sleep deprivation talking, but he was so tired, and he was so in love, and he just, he just…
He tangled himself further around Etho. He was much taller than his husband. He threw a leg over Etho’s hips and wraps his arms around him as far as he could reach, holding this small, beloved form as close as he could, as if he’d starve without every conceivable point of contact he could find.
Etho didn’t fight him. He wrapped his arms around Doc’s middle, as far as he could manage, which wasn’t nearly as much as Doc, of course, he was smaller, but he was rubbing small circles against the creeper mutants back, still making small shushing sounds that reminded Doc of how he’d comfort any of the pesky birds from nightmares.
“…shhh…don’t apologize…”
“But I’m sorry.”
I wanted to give you everything.
“I’m s-sorry.”
I wanted you never to struggle again.
“I’m sorry.”
You still go into danger everyday…because I haven’t fixed things.
“I-I-I…” His voice caught on a sob as he buried his face against Etho’s white hair, felt his fox ears flick a bit against the touch.
“You’re apologizing for making me love you.”
…
Oh.
“I-I am not, I…”
“You are.”
Etho said it cooly.
Said it with the same tone as announcing that the hallway lightbulb had gone out again and he couldn’t reach it and he couldn’t find the step stool so Doc ought to put his tall ass to some use.
Said it with the same finality as every ‘I love you’ and every ‘You’re worth it’ and every ‘I’d do it again’ that had come from his mouth when they’d hashed this problem out again and again and again.
And this wouldn’t be the last time.
They knew that.
The same way Etho would cry out in dim morning hours that he was so sorry he hadn’t made it fast enough to save Doc from being used for the archival eye project. And Doc would say the same thing, albeit perhaps in not so concise of terms.
Doc took a deep, shuddering breath. The metal plates grafted over part of his chest expanded as he did, his augmented arm clicked and hummed as it adjusted, oxygen, redstone, blood and biotech.
And what was he?
“I could never apologize for that.”
“Good. You shouldn’t.”
Etho was probably smiling in that somber sort of way he did whenever they got onto topics like this. It was still pitch dark, and Doc didn’t feel like activating his archival eye for night vision, so he just left it be.
Let himself feel flesh and bone, for just a little while.
Two missing eyes.
A missing arm and a patchwork of scars.
Stab wounds from a gangsters in the Depths right alongside shiny burns from comforting Tango, unwilling to set him down even when he grew too hot to handle.
“…what the hell are we…?” Doc found himself croaking, and Etho made a small humming sound like he was considering the idea. He scooted a bit further up on the bed and his thumb swiped over Doc’s face, hand having moved back up to cup his face. He located his lips, and then kissed him.
“…I’d like to call us in love, sweetheart. If it’s all the same to you.”
Doc found a watery chuckle rumbling in his chest.
Redstone. Oxygen. Biotech. Blood.
All of it loved Etho, though…so what difference did it make?
“It is. Always will be.”
He kissed Etho back in a needy press, pouring into him the way they always had. Pouring into each other until they were equal, or as close as they’d ever get, because being just a bit off-kilter seemed their fate, but it wasn’t any sort of cruel fate.
It was just what they were.
What they always would be.
And Doc would go back to sleep with that notion, and by morning, he’d keep trying to be everything else, knowing that so long as in love was amongst that jumbled pile…he was everything he needed to be.