Chapter Text
Six knows over fifteen ways to kill a man, and he's considering using all of them on Brandon Moses.
As soon as he's cleared on some technicality from Medical. Electrical burns... As if he hasn't been through worse. Scars are something he's used to. But what Moses did… That utter bastard fool of a man. Stealing Holiday's payment all to turn Beverly into a weapon, just extending her torture. All for profit. It's shameful and reminds him all too much of the kind of man he used to be.
People keep saying Six is lucky to be alive, but that part is sort of an afterthought. He's only staying in Medical long enough to have his wounds treated and then they need to work on finding Moses – he needs to, Holiday is where she should be already, with her sister – before the two-timing monster goes completely underground.
Or that's his initial plan, anyway. Before Holiday and Beverly, now out of Providence issued cold weather gear and hanging on her big sister’s arm with a smile, walk through the door and Six feels stuck to the spot without meaning to.
Holiday looks at him the same way she did yesterday or the day before, the same softness that he doesn’t deserve, except now she’s…
Except now it’s different, and has been ever since she looked at his blades and at Moses’s machine and back, asking of him… since he woke up and she was there with him on the ground with tears in her eyes and they were close enough to…
It’s different now. He isn’t sure yet if it’s the bad kind of different, and he hopes it isn’t. But…
“Sorry to barge in, but – I thought Beverly should meet you. We didn’t really have time to, before…” Holiday begins, and for a half second her eyes dip and Six knows she’s remembering a few hours ago. Not dying was better than Six expected, but he still had to pretty much be scraped off the ground by a medical team and whisked away immediately. Unfortunately, it seems that his limits do not include walking off point-blank electrocution. Apart from a brief, surprisingly poignant conversation with Rex after everyone was certain he wouldn’t have another cardiac episode – though Six protests at the term of another; makes it sound like he had some kind of stress induced heart attack when electrical trauma is more apt – he hasn’t had time to debrief.
Which reminds him, Knight asked for them to meet as soon as Six was up. That should probably be Six’s first priority, as much as he would rather put it off. Stealing the keep, stealing a jet, crashing the auction of a neutral party under direct orders not to, participating in untested science… If nothing else, it’ll be interesting.
“Not that Becca hasn’t spent the past hour talking about you,” Beverly chimes in excitedly; oh, he should probably say something. Her sister blushes and nudges Beverly’s shoulder as if that’ll make her stop; which has never once worked with Rex.
“It’s good to…” Meet you, Six starts to say, except he supposes that they’ve already met, both when she was an EVO trying to kill him and right after her cure. “...See that you’re doing well after what happened.”
“Thanks. I guess, same to you?” Beverly shrugs a little awkwardly. “I can never thank you enough for…” The bright, bubbly younger Holiday suddenly looks a little apprehensive. “For bringing me back. 'Saving' me doesn’t even sound lofty enough, seriously.” In response, Rebecca hugs her sister a little tighter.
“It means a lot.” Holiday says, and Six knows that’s not all she wants to say by the way her lips start moving and then stop; she turns to Beverly with a slightly plastered-on smile. “Do you want to go get water or something, real quick? It’s right down the hall, I just need to…”
“Chat with your boyfriend? Right, I get it.” Beverly shows herself out like she’s been walking the Providence halls as long as Rex. She certainly doesn’t lack confidence.
As soon as she’s gone, Holiday pulls up the chair already near Six’s bedside, more of a medical cot though it may be, and takes his hand before he can do anything about it. Luckily, it’s not the hand with the electrical exit wound.
“I can never thank you. I mean it. You… you risked your life for me and my sister, I…” She’s tearing up again. Six is half not entirely sure what to do – and half wants to kiss her. He always knows when Holiday is upset and rarely knows how to resolve it the way that she needs, and so…
“Rebecca.” He says her name for the second time today and she stops, blinking away the teary glaze in her eyes at the sound of his voice. Nudging his hand out of hers for a moment, he caresses her face; gently, like she’s precious; not fragile but precious. “I would do it again in a heartbeat.”
She blinks. He blinks. They’re stuck in time for a moment before she leans in – Six wouldn’t initiate, he wouldn’t dream to –
But then her other hand touches his chest, where it feels like exposed nerves more than skin, even under bandages and the thin shirt he’s been allowed to put on and Six sucks in a sharp gasp through his teeth, pulling away even though he doesn’t want to.
“Oh, shit, sorry,” Holiday retracts her hand quickly and backs up; and it must’ve flustered her, because Six can count the times he’s heard her curse on one hand and at least two of them concerned Brandon Moses and his treatment of Beverly. “I forgot about your…”
“It’s fine.”
“Not really,” Holiday huffs, and sighs, and then gets up. Then turns back around with her arms crossed like she’s just figured something out. “You’re going to slip out of here the second I’m gone, aren’t you?”
“Yes.” Six isn’t going to lie to her. They’ve gotten to the point where she knows him… maybe too well. “Knight wants to see me.” About what, exactly, goes unsaid. “And then I’m going to see what we can do about finding Brandon Moses.” Holiday blinks, again, like she’s surprised to hear that.
“Moses is gone, I mean… with all his connections I don’t see how we could find him.” Surprised… and a little sad. But Six has already committed to it. It’s not just about the money Moses stole or even how it made Holiday feel, because she hates to be pitied and it’s not pity that Six feels anyway. It’s that he stole her family and that is unforgivable. Six isn’t going to let that go no matter what Knight will surely tell him about it, or even the rest of Providence.
“It may take time, but the sooner I get started, the better chances we have.” ‘We’. It goes unspoken that should Six track him down, Holiday is going to be there. At what point did she appear in his mind like some kind of partner, like…
“But…” Holiday stops, and starts again. “Obviously I want to find him and expose him and definitely slap him again,” Her brow furrows just at the thought. “But we have other jobs to do, Six, I… please don’t let me get in the way of anything else. Our jobs are… I mean…” Her eyes linger on his injuries again, his chest and the tightly wrapped, blistered hand as well.
“Just be careful, okay?”
Six looks at her for a long moment, trying to wrap his head around that, but… she’s already left, back to her sister and Six decides to blame that on the lingering medication induced fog.
He goes to meet with Knight, and doesn’t start the search then, either.
Instead he asks Rebecca Holiday out to dinner.