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They didn’t have a name. They didn’t have a past. They didn’t have a purpose.
They came to be in a desert. The sun was beating down on them, ruthless and unrelenting. This was their birth, yet it was a birth unlike any other. They weren’t even sure it could be called a birth. There were no loving parents, no bubbly midwife, no stark white hospital.
Just a train ticket, clutched in between their thumb and forefinger like their life was bound to it. Dependent on it.
They were alone. In all directions, the only thing visible was sand. Everywhere they looked, stretching out to the horizon and beyond - just sand. It was uncomfortably warm beneath their bare feet, any hotter and they’re certain their feet would’ve been burned.
They were dressed in torn, grey rags, and they had no idea how they had gotten there. Or - and the thought that occurred to them next made their stomach plummet in terror - who they even were .
That must’ve been the first thing they ever asked. Silently, in their head, they asked themself who am I?
As they forced themself to their feet and began to wander aimlessly, that question kept rattling around their brain, bouncing off the sides of their skull.
Who am I?
Why had they been born? Why were they alone?
The heat of the dessert was unbearable during the day, and at night they curled into themselves, desperate to conserve any semblance of warmth they could. The desert was unforgiving, and they certainly weren’t equipped to handle it. They had nothing but the clothes on their back and a train ticket tucked safely away in their pocket.
They had so many questions, but all they seemed to know was heat, cold, hunger and thirst. Their stomach was in actual pain from how empty it was. It was like a beast, gnawing away at them from the inside, demanding all of their attention and sapping the little energy they had. Their throat was parched as well. It felt drier than the land around them, aching from lack of moisture.
Three days passed of fruitless wandering. Then they saw it. In the distance. Looking like shapeless blobs at first, but as they got closer and closer they could make it out.
People.
If they had enough moisture in their body to produce tears, they’re certain they would’ve sobbed in relief. They still remember the way hope filled every pore in their body, the way they had run. Despite their lack of energy, despite the screaming of every one of their limbs and organs to slow down, to stop, they ran. Finally, other people. They weren’t alone.
As soon as they were close enough, they had called out to them, a grin already painting their face.
Before they knew it, they were in chains. The people were part of a human trafficking ring. They weren’t alone anymore, but it didn’t take long to wish they were.
They were dragged behind the traffickers. Spat on, kicked. Nothing they said got through to them or mattered. To these people, they were a lump of meat. Just a body, with no soul that they recognised.
A tiny part of them wondered if they were right.
It got worse when the traffickers realised they had an ability. They were forced to use it over and over, for the most horrific deeds.
One time, they had been forced to use it on a woman whose husband owed the traffickers money. The information they had received told them the location of her child, hidden under the stairs.
In their shock, their eyes had flicked over to the cupboard where the child was concealed, revealing her location. A scrap of a girl, with her hair in plaits. She had been trembling in fear.
They took her, and it was all their fault. The cries of her mother as her child was ripped away from her will haunt them forever, of that they are certain.
Yet somehow they escaped. They saw an opportunity, and took it. They ran, and never looked back.
They didn’t run as fast as they had run towards the traffickers in the beginning. It seemed their hope was stronger than their fear, a sentiment that was quickly proved. They thought escaping one monster would mean safety, security. They’ve never been more wrong.
Monster after monster, manipulator after manipulator. No matter how kind the people appeared at first, how desperately they tried to appease them, it always ended the same way.
Right from the start, they were born to play the fool.
Even now, they aren’t free from a monster’s grip. Even now, they’re under someone else’s thumb.
It’s slightly different this time, because this time there appears to be something in it for them.
A home.
Something they had dreamed of, but never, even in their wildest dreams, dreamed of gaining. They were an outsider, born from nothing, with nothing behind them.
They had nothing, but that didn’t mean they couldn’t make themself something.
Thus, they gave themself a name. Sigma.
They found themself a home. Their casino.
They even sort of found themself a family. Their customers. Sigma knew each of their names, their needs.
Sigma may just be a commoner compared to the geniuses and superhumans around them. But commoners can still protect what they love.
They love their casino, its staff, and its customers. All of their time, all their energy, goes into maintaining it. It may have only existed for eight days in reality, but the rest of the world believed it had thirteen long years of history. They would build a legacy worthy of thirteen years.
And in the process, they’d gain a home.
•─────•❀•─────•
Their casino had been threatened. Military police tried to shut it down.
Sigma couldn’t lose it. In this place, they belonged. There was nowhere else where they could be seen as a regular human, yet alone one who truly belonged. This was their small piece of paradise, carved out with their own two hands.
Sigma had always known they would do everything to protect it.
Everything.
So with a hand at their throat, open air whipping around behind them, they make a choice. When it comes down to it, not a difficult one.
“I have no way to win,” Sigma chokes out, with the last bit of oxygen left in their lungs. “As things are, both I and my casino will fall. At least let me save one of them.”
They can’t bring themself to feel remorse as they fling themself out of the casino, dragging the military police member with them.
She tries to stop them, tries to reach out to grab onto the casino. Sigma’s casino.
They won’t let her. They lock her arm in a vice-like grip, refusing to let go.
And for a moment, for a single, glorious moment, everything is okay again. Sigma may die, and they may be bringing someone down with them, but the casino will remain. Their home will stay standing. It will shelter more guests. Their staff will live on, in turn keeping the casino alive.
The moment ends when the police member shifts in his grip, planting her boot firmly onto their chest and kicking them away with all her might.
She grabs onto the casino, and just like that they’ve lost.
Sigma’s eyes widen, tears immediately rushing to their eyes.
Their home.
Their purpose in life.
Without it, they are nothing. It will become nothing now, they will become nothing, and it will have all been for nothing. Those years being used, all the crimes they helped commit, all the blood sweat and tears-
Nothing.
Sigma came from nothing, and now they will return to nothing.
It must be what they deserve.
Sigma doesn’t close their eyes. Perhaps it’s selfish, but they’d like the casino to be the last thing they see. Even if they failed to save it, they should face their failure until the end.
(Deep down, they know they’re just savouring the sight of it. Of home.)
•─────•❀•─────•
There’s a blur barrelling towards them, warm arms wrapping around their middle, and their course is shifted.
Sigma and the mysterious person crash into a ledge jutting out from the side of the casino. They look up, and they recognise him.
It’s hard not to, when the Armed Detective Agency is on national news as terrorists.
“You’re… from the Agency,” Sigma says dumbly. “Why did you help me?”
“Why do you think? To save the Agency,” the boy replies, entire voice steeped in conviction. He’s determined. He has a purpose.
They don’t anymore.
“The only way to save the Agency is to get the page. You know where it is.” He says it accusingly. Distantly, Sigma realises that’s because it is. He doesn’t know why Sigma did what they had to. Doesn’t know their brief past, their dream for the future.
At the reminder of their dream, now impossible, all the fight is sapped from their body.
“Ask whatever you want; I’m exhausted,” they tell him, feeling the words in every bone of their body. “In the end, I never did understand what I was born for,” they add bitterly.
Then the boy is looking at them. His eyes are soft, and sad. Pitying. Sigma finds they don’t hate it.
“Atsushi-kun, look out!” a voice from Atsushi’s phone calls out.
They look to see another figure, from seemingly out of nowhere, dressed in a black robe. His eyes are cold, hard, and entirely devoid of pity.
“Guilty,” he pronounces, raising a finger to point right at Sigma.
They are struck in the chest by his ability, and the combination of shock and the sheer force of the blow cause them to stumble to the side, trip over their own feet, and fall.
Their heart drops, but only a couple of seconds later another hand is sliding into their own. The cool leather glove contrasts the warm blood pooling from their chest as the boy - Atsushi - flings himself over the side to catch them.
It warms their heart, but they push the feeling away.
“Hold on, Sigma-san!” Atsushi calls unnecessarily. His hand is clamped around their own, preventing them from falling even if they did let go.
“It’s fine,” Sigma tries to tell him. “I knew it’d wind up like this.”
It’s the first time they’ve said those words out loud, but they feel the truth reverberating deep within them. They’ve always known it wouldn’t - couldn’t - last. When faced with the geniuses and monsters this world possesses, they can’t even hold a candle. They’re just a commoner. A desperate commoner is stronger than one with no conviction, yet they’re a commoner all the same.
They’ve failed.
Atsushi certainly doesn’t seem to care for their lack of regard. Even after he slips, he flings himself at them again.
“Stop,” Sigma protests weakly. “Let go. You will die too.”
The thought of Atsushi, so full of conviction and purpose, dying because of them makes their chest ache.
“No!” Atsushi screams, startling Sigma into looking up at him. “Having no idea what you were born for… I can’t let someone die with those last words!”
Sigma lets out a mirthless chuckle. “You’re a kind person, and I thank you for believing. For trying,” they say honestly as they let their hand go lax, and let gravity do the rest. “But it’s fine. As a commoner, I did what I could.”
Atsushi screams as they begin to fall, and there’s a twinge in Sigma’s chest. They never meant to burden anyone, and somehow his scream cuts into their heart.
As Sigma falls, they wonder.
If they had been saved by the Agency, become one of them, what would they have become? They failed to give themself a purpose, but they think if they had stayed around Atsushi, Atsushi and his deep care, they may have found one.
As it stands, their regret is swallowing them.
Sigma looks up at the casino. They can’t see Atsushi anymore, but they know he’s still up there.
Perhaps this was how it was meant to go, they think to themself. I was born from nothing. I am nothing. It’s time to return to nothing.