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Fishing rod. Leo's crooked grin. Webs and potion bubbles clinging to them both. Blood that's dripping from beaten and broken armour pieces. Spoke is waiting for the inevitable, and he's doing with a smile on his face that's a little too wide to just be victorious.
Leo doesn't see it. Fishing rod in his shaking hands, he corners himself in the hole dug out for him, the webs keeping him stuck. He has nothing left but his one way out, and Spoke knows that's compromised.
This is it. This is where Leo finally dies.
He knows things couldn't have gone more perfectly. Leo doesn't suspect a thing, his trap hasn't been tampered with and as far as everyone's aware, the stasis chambers haven't been discovered. He's finally got him.
So when he tells Leo exactly what he's doing by denying everything one last time, all he gets is the roll of an eye. In about half a minute, he really never did burn down that village, and he will never have killed those spies. Those blood-stained secrets will be swallowed hole together with Leo in the void. His slate will be wiped clean again and he will have his fresh start. All the loose ends will finally be tied.
Leo levels him with a too-satisfied grin. He fully believes he's untouchable—Spoke almost admires that in him. He's exhausted, the heaves of his chest as he breathes in and out heavily make it stand out almost more than the slight slouch. He's hurt too, obviously; wounds litter his body where his armour broke and stopped being able to protect him, cuts through his ruined suit that discolour the fabrics and his skin underneath in crimson. Some of it drips down his arms, staining the rod he's holding onto a little too tightly to be genuinely unafraid.
"One day. One day, Spoke," he starts, with the shake of his head. He can't keep the satisfaction from seeping into his voice. "If I can't kill you, if a giant army from the Law can't kill you … One day, Spoke, there will be someone else, and they will kill you."
If only he knew. Spoke puts up his best poker face, laughing now will reveal too much. He watches carefully how Leo handles the fishing rod with clear intent. The trap is waiting for them, he's anticipating the pearl, whole body braced for impact.
Once Leo goes through with it … he will be gone.
Spoke is almost scared at the thought. All he's wanted was for those loose ends to be tied, and now when they will be, he's fighting the urge to do something about it. He wants Leo dead. He wants him gone, of course he does.
"Goodbye Spoke."
For a second, his mind flashes to their times when the Mafia was still in control—all roads lead back to the Mafia, don't they?—and he sees a younger Leo, ready to defend hi, fight with him. He sees Leo patting him on the shoulder when they won with such a genuine laugh. He sees that strong BAT leader who was struggling to hide his own grief when Spoke trained with him, but could smile a little brighter when they joked around like they were friends.
They were friends. At some point, they had been friends.
Leo pulls the rod. Spoke blinks and they stare at each other in choking tension. He blinks again, and his body lurches as its pulled halfway across the server. A breath escapes him as shock grips him like the maw of a beast, the switch from icy cold to the heat of the depths of the world too sudden.
By his side, Leo appears too, about a tick or two before redstone behind them lights up. They can't even make eye-contact before the trapdoor beneath Leo's feet opens back up with nothing underneath.
Spoke watches him fall.
Or he doesn't. Like Spoke can't even control his own body, he jumps forward, throwing himself at the hole in the bedrock. He damn near slips in himself, rough stone cutting into his armour and body underneath. He reaches out, into the void, past the bedrock. His claws dig into Leo's arm, his fall is slowed, and Spoke yells as he has to catch himself on the other side of the hole to keep them both up.
Silence holds them hostage. He doesn't know how many seconds it takes before Leo finally looks up at him with wide eyes. They see each other, expressions nothing but shock for a moment. He hangs, and everything stands still in the universe.
Spoke lets his gaze travel to their arms. His claws are digging into Leo's skin, his own skin painted red because of it, but Leo's own hand is clinging onto Spoke's arm with terrified desperation. They're stuck like this, just staring at each other like there should be no way this is where they find themselves in the end.
"You trapped my pearl?" Leo asks. Where he should sound angry and scared, he sounds quiet, a little exasperated, mainly strained with the effort to keep holding on. He never saw it coming.
With a grunt, Spoke has to shift his grip. The position is beyond uncomfortable. Bedrock is cutting into his palm, skin warm with fresh blood that wells up from the violence. He's leaning into the hole almost awkwardly, body twisted in a way that reminds him of all the wounds he acquired during the battle in the least fun kind of ways.
All the blood welling up starts running down his arm. It's reaching Leo's hand, seeping past, underneath, over. Soon enough, they will start slipping.
He grits his teeth. Why the hell did he do this?
"Let me go, Leo!" he forces out, because of course this is Leo's fault. Damn him.
The other tries to lift his second hand to get a better grip, but he hisses in pain and has to let the idea slip, the strain too much. Spoke watches as he looks down past his body, where his fishing rod disappeared into the great abyss, an endless black void that seems to creep closer the longer they stare.
They're quiet for a while after that. Spoke can't get himself to let go, as painful as the grip is starting to become. That blackness is too permanent. He's terrified of it, even if letting Leo go here would pretty much guarantee his own survival.
A strange look falls onto Leo's face when he turns his attention back to both the means of his survival and the reason he's hanging there in the first place. He swallows the lump in his throat. Bullets of sweat drip down his forehead. Pain is etched into every feature, those claws digging into muscle and bone can't make the situation much better.
"If you expect me to beg for my life …" he starts, out of breath instantly, "then you can go die, Spoke."
"Yeah?" he hisses out. When he finally pushes himself up, the rocks cut deeper, and he's too late to stop the whimper of pain. "I don't—think I'm a fan—of dying!"
His own hair is starting to become damp with sweat. Gravity is dragging them both down. He huffs out a pained breath. He won't be able to hold this for long; he either needs to cut his losses and see Leo fall, something he should've done in the first place, something everyone needs him to do, or he hauls him up with a lot of effort.
Surprisingly, the voice in him that's crying out in fear is begging him to pull Leo up. He frowns down at the other. Anger and reason know Leo should die here. He's meant to die here, that's why this trap was made. The selfish side of him is shouting angrily that he's going to ruin his own plan like this, that all his secrets will be uncovered the more he pulls him up. So why is the part of him that feels like little Spoke, the young him, the inexperienced him, why is he so scared of losing him? Leo was never a close friend.
He wants to see him smile again. Leo had been happy once. Spoke wants to see it again, in some cruel kind of way.
"Leo—" He swallows through the pain. His claws are dragging ravines into Leo's arm, slowly but surely. His pain is mirrored on the other's face. "Just—just let me go." So he doesn't have to do it himself, so it's not another death he has to remember every time he sees a grave or a rose or snow now.
Leo clenches his eyes shut. "Spoke." He sounds so out of breath. A long groan escapes him. "What are—you doing? Either—drop me—or pull me up!"
Suddenly, he can't see Leo's face anymore. Tears are gathering in his eyes. He's not sure if it's more embarrassing to blame it on the pain or on how he might lose Leo. A shaky breath in does nothing to help him. What is he supposed to do here? What is he supposed to do?
His arms are shaking badly. Spoke sets his jaw, digs his claws as deep into the rock as he can, and pulls Leo up. Alarm bells are going off in his head, telling him to stop, telling him to let go, but he forces a breath out through his clenched teeth and shimmies around to get a better grip. When he can pull his foot out from under him, he braces it against the side of the hole. It finally gives him the leverage to stand up, and he grabs Leo's bloody arm with his other hand.
He's yelling. At some point, he's noticing. Maybe by the time gravity stops working against him and he can fall back and drag Leo onto the rocks, he has no idea. By then, his head falls back and he groans out. He can finally let his body relax.
Leo ends up on the bedrock next to him, equally as out of breath. The place reeks of blood and sweat. His whole body feels hot, only the slightest odd breeze coming from the hole in the ground.
What did he just do? He stares at the ceiling. There is no telling what happens now.
"What the hell is wrong with you?" Leo asks. He sounds completely and utterly broken. "What was the point of all that? I don't—I don't get you, bro."
"Me neither," is his reply, a bit too honest. He's not looking for forgiveness. By now, he has failed to do what he set out to do and Leo will be free again, let loose on the server to uncover his secrets.
"Yeah … fuck." Leo tries to lift an arm but it falls uselessly by his side again.
Spoke, despite everything, laughs. The exhaustion in his entire being doesn't help the way he shakes with the effort. His ribs hurt, his arms, his stomach, everything. There are still a few golden apples left in his inventory but for the moment, he's too lazy to reach for any.
"This doesn't mean I won't … y'know, do all what I said. I know you lied, Spoke. I know you're hiding shit and I'm not resting until you pay for what you've done."
He lets out an honest-to-god groan at that. "Leo, bro! I'm not the reason BAT got destroyed, okay? Maybe—" Spoke licks his dry lips and shakes his head, staring up at the deepslate ceiling above them. "Jumper left because you misused her spies. I didn't do that. You know better than me what BAT stands for, but even I can see you lost the plot, bro."
Shuffling makes him tilt his head over. Leo is standing up, and failing mostly at that, needing the wall to stop him from falling over. A harsh glare is sent his way, one that doesn't quite speak of forgiveness. Golden apples appear in Leo's hand, and one of them falls at Spoke's side.
Oh. Okay, unexpected.
"Don't think I will forgive you. We're not done."
Spoke doesn't watch him eat. He also doesn't watch him leave. It takes him too long to grab his own and set his teeth into it. The healing effects that wash over him don't do enough to dull the pain.
He's not happy about this, not at all. This was supposed to be the end of all this drama. Why, just why did he have to do that?