Fic: In Living Memory

[ranalore.livejournal.com]

Title: In Living Memory
Author: Rana Eros
Spoilers: For "Two."
Word Count: app. 380
Summary: "What is precious is never to forget."
Author's Notes: Written as a coda to the episode "Two." Betaed by Eliza. Summary from the poem "The Truly Great" by Stephen Spender.

In Living Memory

"I had to kill my brother too." She doesn't mean to say that, doesn't mean to ever talk about Ben again, no matter how much she can't get him out of her head with Alec around. But Joshua's so devastated, and they've been talking about Isaac, and it just sort of slips out.

Joshua blinks his huge, sad eyes at her, then predictably says, "Tell me about him."

"He was--" Afraid of you. Terrified of the anomalies in the basement. "He was beautiful," and she doesn't mean what Original Cindy was talking about when she called Alec pretty. Ben made shadow-birds on the walls for her, created the rituals, brutal and soft, they used for the Blue Lady. Even when killing, Ben had been an artist, and at ten she knew he should never be on his own.

"Manticore hurt him," Joshua says, and whether it's prompting or declaration, she doesn't know, but she nods. She can't speak, remembering, and she leans hard into Joshua's solid strength, shaking. He wraps her in his arms, murmurs, "Hey, little fella."

"They broke him," she forces out, low and choked. "They.... He killed--"

"He killed because he hurt," Joshua says, and she nods again. He gets it, and she gets it, and she wishes she had another Manticore facility to burn. For a moment, a cold, clear moment, she imagines what it would be like to rip them all open, tongues and teeth and hearts scattered, like she's had to scatter her brothers and sisters. Like she's been scattered.

Joshua makes a keening sound, not quite human, but the splash of his tears on her knuckles feels like her own, and she pulls herself back into the moment, where she's learned to live best. In the moment with Joshua beside her, mourning their brothers. With Alec probably hustling Sketchy at pool again, safe to be a pain in her ass, and as many of her other siblings as she's been able to find smuggled across the border. They're all victories better than body parts, better than smoldering ruins. They're what Manticore didn't want any of them to have, and now she's going to keep them all with the memory Manticore gave her.

"Tell me," she whispers to Joshua over their brother's grave. "Tell me more."

END