ETHAN

"Run, Ethan! Run!"

I would have let you run. Why didn't you run? Maybe I could've found a way for you to be free.

He sat there with his back to the wall and his entire body stinging with pain with Keren slumped into his arms. He flattened his shoes against the tile of the washroom, the concrete of the pavement when Mother pushed him out of the way, dying in his place.

"You're a monster!" Keren screeched, overlapping her voice. "You're a monster and I hate you!"

Why did you push me out of the way? Ethan set his hands against the floor and tried to lift his shoulders off the wall of his betrayal, a failure to the last with a shattered promise staining his hands red. He stared down at Keren, who no longer responded when he touched him. A horrible storm of dominoes. He chewed on his tongue at her last request for him to run, to get away from her. Water dripped from the faucet, and he listened to footsteps, but none came. Air lodged into his lungs when he looked down at Keren again. I just... wanted you to... love me, Miama. He shut his eyes tight and stared death in the eye, pushed out of its way again and again.

Ethan tilted around to the weapon he kicked out of Keren's self-malice.

"It should've been you."

In the entrapment of silence, he measured the distance between him and the broken parts. He lifted Keren off of him to set him on the floor, where the feeling in his legs returned when he hauled himself off the ground.

"It should've been you."

He shuffled for the pieces and picked up the carapace of the loaded blaster against their life. It sat in his palm, a threat to Keren's life. He slipped the pieces back into place, knee-deep in crimson when it let out a short hum and edevium loaded into the chamber. His fingers wrapped around the hilt, behind the release as he came face to face with every consequence.

Why? Why did you push me out of the way when you hated me? When you thought I was a monster? He chewed on the corner of his lip when he moved his finger over the release, the final escape, but not the one he wanted for either of them. Another perfect line. He slipped his finger off the release and closed off the chamber from its own escape. Could... we have been happy? He holstered it and found himself without the ability to cry anymore, getting off the floor to head back to Keren. You two would've been happy...

"Keren." Ethan scooped him off the floor, listening close to the outside, the outside with space to run. To fly. His heart hammered with a second chance. He frowned down at Keren, then lifted him off the floor. His weight slacked against him, but Ethan tugged him along with ease out of the basement bathroom of their empty house lacking in love, stopping short in his burst of stupidity.

... I can't escape. Not this. Not anymore. He checked on Keren, then sighed. But just maybe... maybe I can give my life for his. Like... I should've done it back then for her. He continued on with the adjustment, grabbing one of his coats to wrap it around Keren, whose eyes fluttered open, though shut them once again when Ethan drew the hood over his head. Ethan glanced out the window, with the casino as bright as ever, with Father long out of sight, one loose end destroyed. Ethan dragged Keren out, stumbling on the first step before rushing to his Cobra, laying Keren flat across the backseat before closing the door behind him, making sure it locked before retreating back into the broken home.

He ran up the staircase, using the expectation of staying low after a bloodstained job, though against the time limit shook his bones when he stomped into Keren's room, opening his school bag and emptying it for more room. He slipped the ships into their holders, sorting them on the bottom of the bag, pocketing the scout he built for Keren. At his bookcase, he grabbed every piece of book Keren had on ships, including the flight manual given to him — the one he accepted from Chalen. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. He pushed the books inside, then brought it with him into his room, detaching his tablepad from its slot before tucking it underneath his arm. His perfect storm of forced opportunity. Down the steps once more, he ran back to Keren, who hadn't moved.

He put the bag in the passenger's seat before escaping from the driveway, speeding away from the casino's glaring lights. His hands shook against the wheel when paved streets turned into familiar, crunchy gravel. In his peripheral vision, the ghost of Jesti teased his baby brother, who bounced in the back seat, excited for a lie. Ethan chewed on his life when he sped into the cottage grounds. Sunlight glittered across the lake, where the boats bobbed against the pier. Ethan left the bag and his own table pad to get Keren out of the back, tugging him to the front porch of the cottage. Key in his hands, he slid it through the slot, where it purred to life and let him inside. He slammed his foot into the couch bed's activator, where it rolled out the mattress. With Keren safely on top of it, he ran back out to the car, cursing his life as he drove the car among the trees, out of sight, then reached over to the passenger's side to grab the bag and the tablepad, using his knee to slam the car shut.

Blood coursed through his ears when he reentered the cabin and locked it behind him. He threw out the books onto the dining room table, keeping the protective metal shutters over the windows. Ethan sorted through them, battling his own lack of interest to open them all to the first pages. Tablepad in front of a chair, he hooked it up and checked once more around the cottage, the only place he ever felt close to happy.

No... No, I won't do this again.

Ethan tapped his wristpad and shut off every alert. They're too busy sitting on their success. Us? Maybe I can use that to... to finally do this right. He tore the wristpad off and tossed it to the side, with no one left to message him out of concern or care. As his tablepad booted up, he sat down and read through the first pages of Keren's multitudes of books, before testing the end of his luck and searched for the escape Keren deserved the most.

His fingers hesitated over the request form, and he checked on Keren once more, for a life he could never have. He frowned, then returned to the dangerous task, tapping the button to retrieve the request form for Keren's singular dream of flying free. With Keren's name but his transcripts altered with his own grades, he waited in silence for the entrance point to freedom not meant for him. He folded his arms on the table and waited for the confirmation, listening to the lake lap against the shore and piers without the idyllic view. He tore out strands of his hair before his tablepad beeped sweet release, and he opened up his correction of an entrance exam, not for himself, but for the one person he had left in the world.

It was a long night full of numbness as he read through every book and let go of any sort of prepwork as he filled in the blanks and extended his knowledge Keren would be able to fill in actuality. His hands shook while his body gasped for life, for sleep, but he ignored it. Ignored everything with checks over his answers to the life he led, only stopping to make quick meals for them both, with Keren quick to return to an endless daze.

Entrypoint sent in the dead of the next night, he slipped into his own arms and grappled with his sleepy consciousness, but refused to shut his eyes for his sense of danger. A continuous trickle down his spine until the stars sent another beep, and he flinched away from the light. Exhaustion swept through his limbs when he pushed the books aside, breathing deep of his one small act of defiance, finding final success. He uploaded the data onto his datapad, and as it worked, he dragged himself out of the seat.

At Keren's side, he pulled him into a sitting position, where Keren flinched and trembled.

"I just want you to listen to me," Ethan said and dug his fingers into his shoulders when Keren pressed his hands over his arms. "Just once, Sellzora. If you are to take anything from this it is that you are the only one I have ever cared for since Miama." He bit down on his tongue, at his lack of a happy life. "I can't come with you. I have to make sure you can't be followed, but I'll do my best to keep them focused on other things." He shook him gently, and Keren blinked in confusion, though it no longer mattered if Keren heard him at all. "And no matter what happens to me, just spend that time flying far away from here. From this. I refuse to watch this take you away from me. You'll be safe and happy off this starsdamned planet, away from this bullshit you were born into." Ethan clung on tighter. "You deserved so much better than what you got for a brother, Sellzora. I can't turn back time and have her here instead. She's dead because of me, because I'm a monster. Hate me, but at least you'll live."

Just let me do this once, Miama. Let me have the ability to cover his tracks and finally let him run.

Ethan took in a shuddered breath, then embraced him tight. "I just want you to be happy, I've been dead for a long time. You can't make dead men happy, they can't talk anymore. Anything they had to talk about died with them." He held him tighter, squeezing his baby brother for the last time. "I hope you can find happiness out there in the stars, find people who care about you just as much as I do." He released him as Keren's alertness spun in his eyes. "There is no excuse I can give to you, but I want to do one thing right for you even if it means we never see each other again. It's for the best. I see that now." Ethan drowned in her memory and her haunted ghost as it got out of his reach. "I'll get you out of here, and I don't want you to ever turn back."

I'll pay any price to keep you safe.

Keren winced closer to him, and didn't reply to his words. Ethan let him go, where Keren tucked himself back into the blankets and turned his back on him. He lifted himself off the bed, his last act of rebellion on the waves of betrayal as he grabbed his datapad with Keren's sole escape ticket. The last remains of his heart burned to ashes as he held it close to his chest, and set free both their memories and lives from his existence. He put the datapad away. I won't say anything when I give it to him. I'll give it to him, and he is going to take his chance to run. He is going to run and I'll have finally done something right. Something I wanted to do for her. He doesn't have me to chain him anymore. Ethan held the sides of his head when they pulsed with exhaustion, but it was far from over. He sliced his fingers through his hair, stumbling for someone else's life.

Goodbye, Sellzora. Go live your life.