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Years ago, Rome installed his own men within the ranks that flanked Thee.
His brother was too full of a sort of whimsy that Rome had stripped himself of.
Back when he was sent away, under the guise of learning how to become the man that his father expected him to be, Rome had promised himself that he’d be his brother’s shield.
He’d take on what Thee couldn’t. Not because Thee was incapable, but because Thee was not what the world they lived in expected him to be.
Sure, Thee was ruthless too. He was cut from the same cloth that Rome was made of: the kind of man that walked into a room and commanded it as if it was his birthright. He was an expert marksman and the kind of person you’d want beside you in the midst of battle. He’d once taught Rome everything he’d known: how to hold a gun without faltering, how to turn your cheek just at the right moment so that the blood doesn’t splatter into your eye, and how to hide the shake in your body when you finally realize what you’ve just done.
But Thee’s ruthlessness was to fit a mold. It was something to fill the spaces that he couldn’t bend himself to, force himself inside of, and make his body fill. It was to fill the shoes of a man that looked him up and down in a way that couldn’t hide his disappointment.
His acts sought approval, but they always fell too short.
Too many seconds between gunshots.
Too many borders crossed.
Too much mercy.
Too soft.
He could be ruthless, but you had to shove him into it.
And that wasn’t good for a kind of life that needed it to be the first thing on your mind whenever you stepped into a room.
So, Rome took his place: the second heir stepping into the shape that the first heir left behind because he was carefully pushed to the side.
Because Rome was ruthless. He was cunning. He was brutal.
It was a necessity too, just the kind that people didn’t consider much.
For Thee, so that their father could stop looking at Thee with a disappointment that made him shrink into himself, despite being a full grown adult.
For Thee, so that he could absolve himself of the guilt that he carried when he left Rome behind. So that there was a purpose to the time lost between the two of them. So that he knew that Rome didn’t leave, wasn’t commanded to a different part of their world, for no reason.
But Rome was gentle too.
Inside of him was a mausoleum that held memories that could make him fall to his knees, to mourn the boy he once was.
It held all the footraces between himself and Thee, under the blazing hot Italian sun at their family vineyards.
It held sepia toned flashbacks of Thee correcting the placement of his forefinger on a handgun borrowed from Khun Alof.
Old parties in the dark, under thin sheets with flashlights, looking through scrapbooks full of newspaper clippings about their mother’s work.
Bike rides and scuffed knees.
Shared jokes under apple trees.
The kind of stuff that makes Rome reach out in the dark for something to hold onto while he’s away, unsure when he’ll return and if he’ll still be remembered as the same boy that he was back then. It gentled him when he shook for too long from the adrenaline of a raid. It soothed him when the dark lasted for too long. It eased him when he couldn’t bear to reach for the phone and ask for the only person that could still remind him that he was someone else once, too.
The mausoleum reminded him of the necessity of his ruthlessness and who it was for.
For himself. For Thee.
And for him, too.
For Mok.
He’d be this man for them. The kind of man filled with paranoia, enough to want to infiltrate his brother’s trusted guards with his own. The kind of man that asks for permission later, worries about forgiveness at the end of it all, instead of saying that he needs this to be able to sleep at night.
—
He receives the call at 10:45pm in Hong Kong.
A gruff voice on the other end of the line delivers the news swiftly.
Khun Thee and Mok were ambushed.
They drove back to Khun Peach’s house after hearing a gunshot behind their envoy. As they arrived, they witnessed Shohei ‘Touch’ Tatsuya’s men attempting to storm Peach’s house. Thee’s men blocked the street with their vans, surprising Tatsuya’s men. Touch stepped out of his vehicle and instigated Thee and his men into an exchange of gunfire. Several of Thee’s men were hurt, but will make it through the night.
The story slows there and Rome’s chest pounds.
“George.”
“Khun— additional reporting from our team that was part of the gunfight reports that your brother dispatched Khun Mok to make sure that Khun Peacharayat was safe during this time.”
“How’s P’Kian?”
“Khun Thee has minor bruising and has been discharged from the hospital,” Khun George tells him, “However, he is remaining at the hospital and—”
George pauses. Voices fill the space he leaves behind, some panicked and some calmer. Rome overhears Thee’s voice, raised and straining.
“Khun George?”
Nothing. Just the voices, muddied and unintelligible.
Then, the line goes dead.
—
Years ago, Rome installed his own men within the ranks that flanked Thee.
Thee would call it paranoia but Rome knows better.
Another one of Rome’s men briefly sent out an update two hours into the flight. Through the update, he sounded haggard, out of breath, and slightly dodgy.
Touch’s father, after hearing of his son’s attack, sent men to the hospital to finish what his son started. Rome forgives Khun George’s actions. He was posted by Thee’s side to protect. If hanging up on Rome and failing to complete his report meant that he could be by Thee’s side faster, that was part of the job.
But it’s the rest of the awful silence that gets to Rome. Khun Tiago excused himself quickly and Rome let him go.
Two awful hours on the jet and 45 minutes in the van full of silence. Two hours of Khun Alof asking Rome to sit and save his energy, 45 minutes of him looking at Rome in the rear view mirror trying to stop him from jumping out to run to the hospital.
“Can no one pause for a fucking second and give an update—”
“An EMP was deployed on the entire hospital, Khun Rome.”
“—and what about the rest of the time?”
Khun Alof looks at him in the rear view mirror and Rome wants to curse at him, but he holds back.
“Our teams are actively focused on the casualties on site,” Khun Alof tells him, “As the hospital also serves the public, there were some precautions we had to take—”
“Were they not in an Arseni hospital?”
Khun Alof shakes his head. “Khun Thee and his party were brought to the nearest hospital as they required immediate attention.”
Rome groans and punches the back of the headrest in front of him. “And now?”
“The party—”
“P’Kian and who? Khun Peach?”
The look that Khun Alof sends him through the mirror only further angers Rome. He holds himself back from throwing himself out of the car only because he has no idea where they’re heading to.
“Khun Mok was also—”
“Drive,” Rome commands, “Just fucking drive.”
—
Khun Game meets them in the lobby.
Rome follows her with a sense of dread that is unfamiliar to him.
Her silence is not unfamiliar. It’s something he’s grown up with. If she had welcomed him with anything but silence and her stern face, he’d have crumbled to his knees.
The sense of dread is from the way that she doesn’t look back at him and debrief him on anything. It’s as if she was sure that, every single step of the way, Rome would be behind her.
Rome knows how they think of him as an unpredictable wildcard. There was only one thing they were ever sure about when it came to him. It was an unspoken thing that they all held in their chests, among their ranks, staff break rooms, and hallways. The kind of thing that you acknowledged only for a few seconds until you were forced to look away and because of a deep sense of sadness you never thought you’d ever feel for someone like Rome.
As they head to the elevators, more of Thee’s men join them, his own men within their ranks. Only Khun Alof and Khun Game get into the same elevator as him, giving them some privacy.
Rome looks at Khun Game’s reflection on the metal walls of the elevator. Her body is stiff, taut as if she was seconds away from snapping. He wants to speak but he doesn’t want to be the one to break the silence.
“Is there a status update that you can give us at this time, Khun Game?”
Khun Game hums at Khun Alof.
“Your father is requesting that you speak with him before you—”
Rome scoffs. “Is he fucking with me or what?”
“Khun—”
“He’s all the way in Hong Kong,” Rome sneers, “He’s not here but he wants to talk to me? Before I get to P’Kian and everyone else? Is he fucking serious?”
“Khun Thee and Khun Peach are well,” Khun Game answers him, “Your father has already spoken with Khun Thee and… and asks that you meet with him first before—”
The elevator doors open and he exits, trying his best not to shove Khun Game out of the way out of respect for her.
“Khun Rome!”
“Tell my father he knows where to find me if he wants to talk to me that bad.”
—
He sees Thee first.
He’s pressed against a column with his arms crossed on his chest. His suit is torn in some places and he looks haggard. Rome wants to call out to him but something in his chest tells him not to.
As he approaches, Thee looks up and his face falls.
“Did you—”
“No,” Rome tells him, “You think I came here to get yelled at?”
Rome drags Thee into a hug, ignoring the hiss that Thee lets out.
“I’m okay,” Thee tells him, “I’ll be fine. We’ll be—”
“Is Khun Peach okay?”
Thee looks at him, eyes searching for something that Rome isn’t aware of. He nods and Rome feels a tiny part of the weight on his chest disappear. “We got to him fast,” Thee tells him, “It was good that he called Mok just before—”
Thee pauses.
“Rome, I—”
“Is he okay?”
Thee would never lie. He wouldn’t keep things from Rome, especially when it comes to something this drastic. Rome tightens his grip on Thee’s arm, a desperate grip that he hopes conveys his want for an answer that won’t cut him at the knees.
“I promised no one would die while I’m around,” Thee tells him, “Have I ever broken a promise to you?”
Rome presses forward, leaning his forehead on Thee’s shoulder. “No, phi.”
“Not now,” Thee reassures him, “Not ever.”
“Can I see him?”
Thee pulls Rome away from his chest and looks him straight in the eyes. “Rome—”
“P’Kian,” Rome begs, “where is he?”
“Father met with Peach,” Thee tells him in lieu of an answer.
Rome stills.
“He’s… he’s speaking with Mok now.”
Rome pulls himself out of Thee’s hold. “No,” Rome pleads, “No— P’Kian, he—”
“Do you trust him, Rome?”
Rome laughs. “With our lives, phi,” he answers, “but with this? With all of this? Absolutely fucking not.”
He trusted Mok with his brother. He trusted Mok with his family when they were in Bangkok. He’d trust Mok to hold a loaded gun to his face.
But with this? The thing that simmered between the two of them and burned when either one of them touched it?
He knows Mok. Rome knows the way Mok holds back because of some imagined future that’s fallen apart before they even had the chance to step into it. He knows that Mok sees them as a liability, further driven in by his father’s stupid rule about love.
Rome knows the rule; has studied it until his eyes could no longer stay open.
His father, for years, let them believe that love was not allowed. Love was something to turn away from, lest it make you into something weak and fragile. Love could distract you and burn you before you ever knew there was even a fire.
But Rome has studied the rule.
Has nailed it to his bedroom ceiling and let it be the last thing he sees before he sleeps.
Love: the fickle and brittle kind? Not allowed. It burned too quickly. It unbalanced you. It turned you fearful of the consequences of the next day.
Their father spoke of something different.
Something that Rome saw in Mok, even after years of distance and silence.
It was the steady kind that helped him wake up in the morning and reach for the day ahead. It gave him a reason to come home at the end of the day. It turned him away from reckless and thoughtless decisions that could drive him to the grave.
It was real. It was the true kind of love that their father wanted for the two of them.
But as smart as Mok was, he probably didn’t see it that way.
“P’Kian,” Rome says, “where is he?”
“He’s with Peach.”
Rome breathes out a thankful sigh.
Peach.
The only sane man around Thee and Mok.
The only person that could make Mok think.
“He asked Peach to stay with him and Peach obliged,” Thee tells him, “No one’s allowed in there right now, Rome.”
Thee gestures to the door in front of them, where two of Thee’s guards (actually Rome’s guards) are stationed. “I’ve already spoken to Peach,” Thee tells him.
Rome looks at Thee, really looks at him for the first time since he found him in the hallway.
His suit is torn in some places and he still looks haggard.
But there’s not a trace of melancholy on his body.
As a matter of fact, he looks impatient. Something he’d never be if things had gone bad between himself and Khun Peach. He looks as if he’s just waiting for the door to burst open and for Peach to let him back inside. It’s a sort of patience that Rome has never seen in Thee, even back when they were younger and Thee was struggling through tutoring Rome through basic algebra.
“Yeah?”
Thee nods. “Yeah, Rome,” he says with a smile on his face, “We talked.”
“And he’s talking to Mok now?”
Thee laughs. “Yeah, Rome,” he answers, “they’re talking.”
Rome smiles and Thee pats him on the cheek.
“You may not trust Mok,” Thee tells him, “but I trust my Peach.”
“Yeah?”
Thee smiles and nods. “All we have to do is wait,” he tells Rome, “Think you can do that, Rome?”
Rome nods and pulls away from Thee. “I’ve got a decade’s worth of practice, phi,” Rome answers, “what’s another hour or two?”
Thee pats him on the chest and rolls his eyes. “Then sit your ass down, kid,” Thee tells him.
Khun Alof seemingly materializes beside the two of them and stands guard by their side. Rome nods at him as he takes a seat on the bench across from the room that Peach and Mok are inside of. He stares forward but looks up when he feels a hand brush his shoulder. Rome sees Khun Alof’s arm fall back to his side, so he looks up at him.
“Khun?”
Alof shakes his head and tilts his chin toward the door.
At the bottom of the door, Rome sees the shadow of feet shuffling.
“Ready?”
Rome lets out a laugh and shakes his head. “Not really, Khun.”
Khun Alof huffs out a sigh and Rome can tell he’s holding back an eye roll. “Oh well, Khun,” he answers, “here they come.”
Thee places a hand on Rome’s knee and squeezes.
“Here they come.”
—