Chapter Text
Cold air bit at Varian's cheeks as he sat on the cliff’s edge, legs dangling over the jagged drop, far much further than he should be. The wind tugged at his hair, as if trying to pull him back from doing something that he would sooner or later regret. But he barely noticed, he gazed focused on the horizon where daylight was slipping onto shadow.
Around his neck, the dog tags sung gently, their faint click against one another being the only sound to break the silence between them.
Five years. Too many nights spent chasing ghosts, too many empty promises that Zemo might be out there, somewhere out there for Varian to find. His heart was hollow, unsure how to release all these emotions and feelings that he has suppressed over and over again. Each lead ended the same: silence. Absence. A hollow space where Zemo should’ve been.
Varian held the tags in his hands, pressing them to his lips as he let the cool metal ground him before his anger began to surge up into his chest again, the burning sensation was something he was used to at this point. He’d been looking for so long… People thought he was crazy, people thought he was stupid to keep on going like this.
“I should hate you for this,” he whispered to himself, voice cracking against the stillness of the air. “For leaving me with nothing but scraps. But I can’t. Not when I just know you’re out there… When I just know-” Varian had to cut himself off as his jaw tightened, knuckles clenching around the chain as they turned white. He was holding onto something so tight as if he was afraid to lose it.
It only took him a moment but Varian let go, the tags dangling to hit his chest, but then he laid them flat in his hand. Looking at them. Reading them Baron Helmut Zemo - Sokovian Intelligence - EKO Scorpion - Blood Type : XX. It was scratched out from being worn so much. Not even a simple thing about him was on here. These tags meant everything to Varian.