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With every second that ticked by, his heart struck against his frail ribs even harder, his pulse in his throat and his eyes pricked with nervous tears.
He was Murdoc Faust Niccals; he couldn’t lose like this. He had made it so far. Twenty years of fighting to maintain the will to live, the turning point in the shape of the devil. Just a simple little deal changed his life for the better. Escaped poverty and rose to fame with a snap of the fingers, fawned over by ladies and gentlemen alike, strumming basslines that would be iconic decades after they were recorded. Made a little mistake in Mexico but used his wits and his charm to get out of there, carrying on with no consequences. Until, of course, they took his little girl’s life for collateral. There was a lot of grieving and mourning that had to be done of course, but years down the road, it seemed like they might have actually been able to leave the Plastic Beach and be forgotten about. He had tasted hope on his tongue for months.
So why did it have to end like this?
A thunderous boom from the beach made the entire building quake, chunks of the ceiling breaking away; every piece that made contact with his skin set him on fire. He let out a groan of panic, casting a swift glance at the collapsing tile, eyes stinging from the dust.
He frantically dug through the desk, haphazardly throwing notebooks full of unused song lyrics and unsent letters and venue addresses wherever they would fall. Half-drank bottles of rum and whiskey and vodka, chloroform rags, staplers. Next drawer. Old pictures, ancient books, framed drawings of himself and the other two scribbled by the eternally thankful hand of someone long gone. Next drawer. Condoms. Lube. Pill bottles, some empty, some not. Next. Paperwork. Scrapped album covers. Next. Spare boots. The final drawer was bare.
Where the hell was the gun...?
Before he could process anything else, glass shattered into thousands of little pieces at the far window, Murdoc defensively hunkering behind the desk and throwing a protective arm over his face, mint skin smelling of blood and sweat. He could hear the wind whipping through the new hole in the wall, the temperature plummeting rather quickly and feeling ghastlier than the typical tropical humidity that plagued the studio. Murdoc’s lungs tightened and he gasped for breath, squeezing his eyes shut and gathering the courage to peer around the scratched-up metal. Someone was calmly stepping overtop the glass shards, the crunching under their heels reminiscent of bone.
Exhaling through his nose and a growl of defeat rumbling behind his lips, Murdoc slipped a calloused hand overtop the final drawer, clicking it shut. Bringing himself to his feet, he stood as tall as he could and watched with hesitant eyes behind his bangs at the Boogieman, judgeful red eyes staring directly into his soul.
“Motherfucker,” was all he could say, voice hoarse with hysteria, assessing the room and realizing that there was no way out. Not without trying to shove past the entity first, and that was the cowardly way to die.
The sunset beat down heavily outside, and between that and the constant explosions from the pirate jets, the Boogieman was nothing but a silhouette lit up by flame. He stood quietly, eyes boring holes through Murdoc’s forehead, as the foundation rumbled again and took even more chunks of the ceiling tile with it. Murdoc swallowed the lump in his throat and let out a sheepish laugh, raising a hand in a shrug.
“Hah... well!” He began, standing up as straight as he could manage, trying to hide the shaking in his joints by drawing attention to his hat instead as he fixed the brim. “You found me, you old sod. Took you long enough.”
Figuring it was going to be one of the last times he ever did it, he held up a finger in wait and cleared his throat, reaching down to grab one of the rum bottles. He closed an eye in a wink when he noticed how the Boogieman tensed, whipping an arm up in front of him and readying his cloak. Revealing the bottle, he dug the cork out with one of his claws, flicking it away.
“No worries, lad, no gun,” Murdoc gave him a grin, his broken nose whistling as he breathed through it, “Couldn’t find it. You lucked out. Bet I’ll be the easiest kill you’ve had in awhile, huh?”
He lifted the bottle to his lips, tilting it back as the alcohol slid down his throat like water. It burned a bit more than usual, but he didn’t care. He didn’t allow himself air once, continuously nursing it until he had drank the last drop, gently setting the heavy glass back onto the desk. Gunfire outside hinted him that Cyborg was still in the fight, shooting down the jets alongside the collaborators. He felt kind of bad that they had been caught up in everything too, but at the end of the day, once Murdoc was dead, the pirates and the Black Cloud and the Boogieman wouldn’t care about anybody else. They’d leave the pink island with their souls intact.
Murdoc, however...
Well, that was highly unlikely.
He swallowed the image of the Boogieman again, who took a step closer. He towered over Murdoc (even in his beloved Cuban heels), fingers even pointier than his. His nose was proper fucked , if Murdoc was being honest, and his arms were unhealthily skinny underneath all of the fabric of his cloak. If one looked close enough, you could even see his ribs.
“Well, I’m not gonna lie to you, I’m scared shitless at the moment.” Murdoc admitted, crossing his arms and stepping even closer to the wall, his back now pressed flush. Hot tears pricked his eyes again and his jaw stiffened, but he held the typical grin he was famous for. “Didn’t think I’d actually be captured. Thought I hid far enough away that I could escape everything. Got quite a few people who don’t really like me, see? I’m well respected within the music community, but anywhere else, I’m on the very top of everybody’s shitlist.
“Did you wrong all those years ago, didn’t I? My mistake. I’m truly sorry. I was young and reckless then. If you’re a longtime Gorillaz fan by chance--and let’s be honest, who isn’t?--you probably know that I sold my soul to good ol’ Satan down below to guarantee us some fame. It sure as hell worked, didn’t it!”
He paused for a minute, assessing the entity for any sort of reaction. When the Boogieman still lingered in the same spot, Murdoc ran a finger under his eye as cooly as he could, continuing.
“See, that’s why we’d have a bit of a problem here. My soul is already sold, lad! It’s gone. My name’s signed in blood at the bottom of an awfully long contract. There’s legal proof. If you took my soul, that means the contract would be voided, and I really don’t want to find out what that would mean.”
Murdoc could hear his heart in his ears as he lifted his chin in wait of a response, a series of explosions rattling off outside. He closed his eyes and exhaled shakily through his nose as dust filled the room, the ceiling cracking in the corner. He could hear sirens echoing from the depths of the building, signaling that something was wrong in the basement. Plastic Beach was falling apart.
“...Have you lost your damn mind?”
Ice cold terror shot down Murdoc’s spine at the sound of the Boogieman’s voice. The hair on the back of his neck stood on end and he dug his spine into the drywall, pulling his hands to his chest and digging his claws into his palms. He suddenly became acutely aware of his bangs in his eyes.
“Do you honestly think that you could reason with me? That you could stand there and convince me to leave here without your end of the deal?”
“This isn’t real.” Murdoc whispered intensely to himself, recoiling at another boom outside. He could hear the wall crack behind him.
“You always had everything fucking handed to you.”
“Only a dream, Murdoc, only a dream,” his voice cracked, sliding a hand up to his fringe to pull on it stressfully, clamping down on his lower lip so hard that he could taste warm copper.
“I never gave into that, though, did I?”
“What the fuck am I on...?” Murdoc broke, defensively pressing his palms up against the quaking wall, smoke-heavy lungs constricting on themselves.
The Boogieman let out a cackle, eating up the green man’s fear as eagerly as dessert; the laugh was so familiar that Murdoc felt his knees go weak like they did in his distant memory. Tiny hands gripping onto the grimy carpet for dear life as bottles broke against the wall and cigarettes burned themselves out in ashtrays. Calloused hands tearing at his arms so roughly that they nearly snapped his fragile bones in half. Spitting on his tiny broken face and ripping at his dirty black hair and screaming at him until hot tears streaked down olive cheeks. Those nights his lips tasted of salt and blood and he cried on his sill for hours, letting the song of the bluebird in the tree outside his window lull him to sleep.
“Hannibal,” Murdoc gasped for air, feeling his throat close up. Terrified tears welled uncontrollably and he choked, trying to get oxygen through the dust. The Boogieman cackled again--harder this time--and slipped slender green fingers behind his head, pulling apart the straps of the mask.
What hid behind it struck Murdoc’s heart hard enough to ice over what wasn’t already frozen in fear. The gaze was hardly recognizable, eyes fogged over with once-bright blue irises now glazed and lifeless. The grey sockets were sunken into mossy skin, the color a much duller green than Murdoc’s was. Thin lips were a pale blue.
The image of his older brother that he hadn’t seen almost a decade was much more different than he remembered it. It wasn’t his face that frightened him the most, however.
What deeply, truly got to Murdoc and made his stomach twist and his throat burn and his mouth taste of bile was his chest--when he moved a certain way, he could catch a glimpse inside the heavy black cape.
Hannibal had no skin or muscle. Chipped black-as-tar bones in the form of a ribcage waited there, with the flesh closer to the shoulders and pelvis remaining, but left in a rotting state where strings of tendons dangled limply and blobs of fat hid tucked away.
He was not alive.
Plastic Beach rumbled again and a chunk of plaster colliding with the crown of Murdoc’s head brought him back, but words refused to leave his throat, his mouth filling with saliva and his stomach starting to lurch.
Hannibal laughed harshly as his little brother got sick on the carpet, not paying any mind to the explosions still rattling the broken window frame from outside. There was a battle on the beach between good and evil, with a few stragglers here and there, but the real fight was in this very room, with a debt about to be payed and a decade-long pursuit reaching its end.
“What’s the matter, Mud?” Hannibal cooed as his brother wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, body trembling as he recovered, standing up straight and trying to play things off. “‘s just me.”
“You were just in prison,” Murdoc looked awfully pathetic, with his knees wobbling and his shoulders drooped and his finger out in disbelief, Hannibal thought. He rolled his eyes and crossed his arms, tapping long claws against the thick fabric. “You... You were stealin’ hubcaps. I saw you--in, in Stoke-on-Trent, Hannibal, I just saw you...”
“Mudsy, 8 years is a long time,” Hannibal interjected, a large portion of the ceiling deciding to collapse on itself in the corner, the walls shifting slightly to account for the hole. Murdoc gasped in surprise as it happened, darting to the side like a startled puppy. The sirens echoed deep in the building. “That’s enough time for people to change, ain’t it? After all,” he scrunched his genetically long nose in disgust, looking Murdoc up and down, “you did."
“Not this bad!” Murdoc broke, throwing his hands up into greasy black hair the same color as his beloved raven’s wings. “You don’t just...! You don’t just--!” He gagged again, clamping his hand over his mouth and stepping out of the way of where he had previously gotten sick to prevent from slipping in it.
The Boogieman took another step closer, glass crunching under his boots, and Murdoc squeaked weakly, trying to back up into the wall and only succeeding in hitting his head. The drywall cracked, shifting down into the floor, where the tile underneath the carpet began to cave in. Murdoc shot his glance back up in terror, fighting against the pull on his long tongue and pressing his hands to the wall again, warm blobs for tears spilling down his cheeks.
“You were so cool and composed a second ago.” Hannibal clicked his tongue disappointedly, putting his hands on his hips. Satan, he loved toying with Murdoc like they were cat and mouse. “What’s wrong? You look like you’ve seen a ghost...”
“Hannibal,” Murdoc cried, hands over his mouth, “This doesn’t just happen... what did you do...?”
“Heroin is a nasty drug, baby brother,” Hannibal said, inching even closer to him, “OD’d. Got out of prison not too long after you came to see me. Remember? Your shitty little band just took off. You were so excited and so proud and you gave me a copy. The only thing I ever did with it was snort fairy dust off the case.”
He waited a minute to drink in the sight that was all-too familiar--Murdoc cornered, trembling like a little bitch, staring up at him with big watery doe eyes as he waited for the inevitable strike of his hand. The last time he saw this, the two of them were still visibly Romani (with Murdoc’s skin just a bit lighter from his mother’s Cuban roots) and they were young. Their father still dressed Murdoc up like a doll and made him sing and dance at bars despite the fact that he was in his 20s. He had only bought his first bass--it was no El Diablo, Hannibal could admit--and paid all of their bills using the money he got off of tips from playing it in the street. Now there they were, systems full of alcohol and drugs and their hearts beating dangerously fast or not at all, Murdoc in his mid-40s and Hannibal supposed to be in his early 50s, not having changed a bit when it really came to it.
“I got out of there, Mud. They let me out early for good behavior. So I went home and shot up on the couch and pushed too big of a dose in and died.” He was close enough to tower over Murdoc now and he did, the smaller of the two tilting his head down so he didn’t have to look at him, squeezing his eyes shut even as tears spilled over. “You know Dad didn’t find me for days? Slept around in bars and hotels and shit and never came home once. Rigor mortis was long over by the time he got to me. I was given a second chance, though, you know that? You might know a thing or two about a friend of mine, I think.”
Hannibal reached out to comb through Murdoc’s hair to give him a false sense of security, their hands looking almost exactly alike. This was familiar too; the two of them shared a few things when they were little, including records (sometimes), their noses, their skin, their bedroom, their drugs. But the most common thing they shared was the fear of their father.
On nights where Hannibal hadn’t decided to lash out on him but their father had, little Murdoc would find comfort in crawling into his brother’s bed, crying against his back and soaking through the thin fabric of his tank top with his tears, quietly hoping that he would turn around and hold him and let him cry until his sobs turned into hiccups and his hiccups turned into soft breaths. Sometimes he did, but most of the time, Hannibal would just shift his body somewhat and gently scratch at Murdoc’s scalp, running his fingers through his hair in silence. This was enough for the tiny little boy, who could usually drift off to sleep fairly quickly, leaving Hannibal behind with nothing but quiet whistling as he breathed through his crooked, broken nose.
Even in such a tense interaction, little Murdoc was brought out again even inside the shell of a man, and Murdoc felt his muscles loosen as his older brother’s nails scraped against his head. It was a dumb, dumb thing to do and he knew it, but the nostalgia brought with it prevented him from fully resisting. He remembered when he would blubber into tears and couldn’t form full words and let snot drip down his nose, shaking and pulling onto the seams of Hannibal’s jeans whenever he had to hide behind him from their father. For some reason, whenever Murdoc sought refuge behind his brother, Sebastian would back off. Hannibal would stand his ground until he did, Murdoc hiding his face into the denim and wishing he could just disappear. He’d then have to be carried up into their room and tucked into bed for the night to calm down no matter how early it was. It was then that Hannibal always let Murdoc trace the tattoos on his arms with his stubby little fingers, always asking what each one meant, despite the fact that he had heard about them a million times before.
Murdoc’s favorite one, though, was on Hannibal’s left hand where the bones of his thumb met the rest of his hand--it was very minimal and hardly noticeable, but that was what made it all the more special to him when compared to the gaudy colorful ones everywhere else.
A small sun and moon outlined in black with no color on the inside that hung over three somewhat smaller outlines of stars, blending beautifully with his brown skin. It had been Hannibal’s first tattoo, he had said, and was a stick and poke done in a friend’s garage when he was fourteen. Despite the haphazard way he had gotten it, it was the neatest tattoo out of all of them. Even after his skin had turned green (somehow, Murdoc noted; he had thought that his own color change pertained to his deal with the devil but maybe it hadn’t), the tattoo stuck out the most. It had been there when Murdoc went to visit him in prison shortly before he left for Mexico and got himself tied up with the Black Cloud.
And it was there now, he could see it; his left hand on his hip as he scratched at Murdoc’s head with his right, the tattoo popped out as if it were glowing. Even on his dead skin, it looked so alive.
Sun, moon, and stars.
Murdoc was finding it easier to recompose himself now, bringing a hand up to wipe at his cheek with the sleeve of his turtleneck. He saw Hannibal stiffen, alert with every move he made, but he didn’t act any further than that. He needed to think of a way out of here.
“I was fuckin’ around in purgatory, you know, and the big man summoned me and told me he’d needed me for a favor,” Hannibal explained, withdrawing his hand and crossing his arms again, but choosing to tower over Murdoc nonetheless to withhold the power complex. Murdoc’s big bulbous eyes peered up behind his bangs, breathing steadying, finally getting ahold of himself. It reminded Hannibal of the times where he would try to fight back; tried to make himself seem bigger than he really was.
“Said he’d made a little deal with you, but you were starting to make deals with someone else, and he wasn’t takin’ too kindly to that, Murdoc,” The Boogieman’s voice began to drip with venom, and Murdoc felt the hair on his arms raise, but he stood still, swallowing hard. His stomach was much less upset now.
“So he said he’d give me a position! It was a really fuckin’ nice position if you ask me--a fifth Horseman! I’d get to take the souls of miserable assholes and make a few deals of my own. I was thrilled as fuck.
“Said if I would do it he would let me live again, but in my corpse of a body. I’d look exactly like I had when Dad found me on the couch, eyes glazed and lips frozen and the insides of my elbows bruised and bloody and all. Of course I jumped at the opportunity anyway, because I mean, who wouldn’t?”
Murdoc put his tongue in his cheek and nodded slowly once he realized Hannibal was waiting for a response. His big brother just kept on going, paying less and less attention to him and more on stroking his own ego. To keep from throwing off his pattern, Mud forcefully made his knees tremble more than they actually were, somehow managing to squeeze out a tear or two.
There you go, you insufferable bastard, buy this little act I’m putting on. Drop your guard for two seconds and I’ll have the upper hand.
He was incredibly thankful that for the split second his walls were down and he was entirely vulnerable, Hannibal hadn’t chosen to do anything to harm him. He was too busy creating a monologue like he was some sort of comic book villain that he hadn’t even considered it.
Plastic Beach boomed, and another portion of the ceiling fell through, and the floor shifted as Murdoc could hear one of the decks in the east wing completely collapse. If he didn’t find a way out of the studio quickly, it wouldn’t matter if the Boogieman got to him at all; he’d be dead either way.
“They treated me like fucking shit. Acted like I wasn’t there most of the time. Always left me in the dust like a runt.” Hannibal seemed really fucking pissed, Murdoc could admit, and his eyebrows pinched and his inhumanly long tongue that Murdoc shared flitted around like a snake behind his teeth with every word. “So I was starting to think that the deal was absolute bullshit--"
“--Sure,” Murdoc broke in with a quiet voice, feeding into the act, swiping under his eye with a finger as if he was still crying.
“--Yeah. So I was starting to feel that it was bullshit and was trying to think of a way out of it, but I really didn’t want to die again.” Murdoc smirked a bit at his brother’s complete disregard of his method acting. He was far too into his story to care. “So we were riding into the desert in Mexico and I see this weird ass guy in a sombrero, and I’m like ‘yeah, okay, maybe I have something this poor fucker’d be willing to sell his soul for, I haven’t taken one in a while’, and of course it’s you. Of course it was fucking you , Murdoc.”
Murdoc remembered that. He remembered that the Boogieman looked absolutely pitiful on his tiny little mule when compared to the other Horsemen, but figured he could profit off of the pity he could give him. He would have never guessed that it was Hannibal, though; that he never saw coming.
“Said you felt like your band was falling apart, even though you were only about to start your second album. Just made quite a lot selling some weapons to the cartel, you mentioned, but it would only last you so long of a way, so you needed a failsafe if your album flopped.
“Said you’d never tell them, but that band of yours was more of a family than your own, and you needed to make sure they never left your side, but it would be creepy if you told them that yourself.
“Said you’d be willing to pay me in a few souls, not just one, and I was intrigued, because how the fuck were you going to do that? You said you’d get me young ones, still pure and untainted by the evils of the world--those were the best kind. We shook on it--I’d make sure your band never left your side to the best of my ability, and once I’d completed all of the jobs we’d talked about, you’d pay me with all of the children’s souls, or you’d pay me with your own.” Hannibal tapped his foot impatiently, one of the ships of the dead pirates outside reaching shore despite the collaborators’ and Cyborg’s best efforts. “So.”
“I think it’s been really fuckin’ clear for a while that I don’t have them, Hannibal.” Murdoc bluntly said, crossing his arms and closing his eyes in disgusted defeat as Hannibal clicked his tongue.
“What a shame, Mud,” The Boogieman sighed with pretense as he began to strap his mask back on, “I was really hoping I’d get to save my baby brother again like I used to all the time.”
Murdoc had weighed the options of a sneak attack, but this sent him over the edge. Clenching his teeth so hard he could’ve chipped them, he saw red as he reached for his rum bottle on the desk, clenching the neck with white knuckles.
“What the fuck do you mean , you used to save me all the time?” Murdoc hissed, swinging the thick glass as hard as he could at the Boogieman’s head, connecting at his temple, “You were no better than Dad!”
Heavy glass shattered into hundreds of pieces, the Boogieman stumbling to the side with the force, throwing a hand up to the contact point, dizzy with trauma for a second.
It was a short second, but it was long enough for Murdoc to tear off into the front of the room, practically throwing himself into the stairwell as he took the stairs down two at a time, some of the steps falling through the second he pressed down onto them. He heard loud wind rushing into the room upstairs as the ceiling of the well clouded to pitch black, taking Murdoc’s breath away in fear again. It wasn’t the entrance to the ground floor like he had been hoping, but it was an escape; he pounded his shoulder against the second level’s door and fell inside, scrambling to his feet and scanning the room for his next move.
More cannonballs and gunshots outside. The ceiling was even worse on this floor, crumbling even faster, and the walls and floor were shifting terribly, making it hard for Murdoc to keep his balance. Refusing to turn his back to anything, he pressed himself against the wall, gripping tight to the neck of the bottle that was a new form of weapon entirely with the broken shards of glass where the body used to be connected. The heavy black flooded from the stairwell to this room, coating the ceiling tile in black before pulling together in the center of the room and forming a human shape again. He didn’t have to look under the mask to know that Hannibal was pissed, throwing his arms out to prepare his cape as he swiftly made his way to Murdoc, who was dumb enough to stop in a corner again.
“Mother fucker!” He screeched as he frantically searched around for an exit, the Boogieman too close to the door to run back out. A window catching his eye, he cast one final glance at the menacing form of what was once his older brother before bolting towards it, strides a mile long as he closed his eyes before throwing himself into it, feeling shards tear and rip into his skin as his sweater soaked with blood. His stomach dropped and he began to freefall, wind deafening in his ears as he crossed his arms across his chest and prepared for impact.
Heavy body colliding with the plastic-riddled sand, he let out an involuntary grunt as oxygen was ripped from his lungs and his bones cracked on the trashed hard ground. Murdoc opened his eyes and felt pain feather down his spine, branching off into his right arm. He tried to get up as quickly as he could, but his old body refused to move any faster, his back searing in pain but his arm much worse. Murdoc gasped for air for a minute as the adrenaline pumped through his veins, giving him enough strength to bring himself to his feet and grab at his arm. He couldn’t move it, and it was definitely broken, but he had escaped. Breaking into a run again, he pushed the back doors open of the studio with his unbroken limb, bolting to the middle of the room. Catching a glimpse of his hat on a door handle, he picked it up in one quick swipe, placing it in its rightful place on his head. The sirens in the basement were much more audible here, the noise piercing Murdoc’s ears and worsening the migraine blooming inside his skull.
The submarines.
It was the only way to escape at this point.
Nearly tripping over the heels of his boots, he stumbled towards the elevator, pounding his fist on the button. After a few seconds when the doors didn’t open, he took matters into his own hands and jammed his good hand into the crack, struggling to pry them apart. Once he opened them enough, he shoved his shoe inside and pried it even further, allowing himself to squeeze in sideways.
Luckily he caught it before he let his foot leave the grate, or else he would’ve fallen to eventual death.
His jaw hung wide open. Shaking in horror, Murdoc peered over the ledge, the siren at the top of the shaft blaring in his ears and echoing against the walls.
The ocean swallowed half of the corridor. If he tried to look deeper, he was met with the dark blue that was the abyss of the deep sea. The bottom of Plastic Beach was entirely gone, elevator and basement and submarine port and all.
How did that even happen...?
Murdoc stumbled backwards and let the doors snap shut on themselves before he accidentally slipped and tumbled into the water. He took a moment to catch his breath, hot tears pricking his eyes again. He felt the wind behind him and his knees threatened to collapse. Murdoc watched as a tear dripped off of his jaw and dripped onto the ground, leaving a dark stain that was barely visible.
2D was gone then, too.
Wherever he was, he probably wasn’t alive, whether that be out on the beach to be plugged full of holes by pirates and the Black Cloud or trying to hold his breath underwater as long as he could until his lungs gave out and filled with dirty saltwater and garbage from the plastic palace.
Murdoc suddenly felt 13 years worth of guilt hit him all at once. Spitting on him, kicking him, punching him, hurting him, making him cry, making him afraid, had any of it been worth it? All 2D had ever wanted was his friendship, and he treated him like absolute shit. Had him kidnapped (by the Boogieman, no less) and held him here against his will, screamed at him for doing absolutely nothing wrong until he dissolved into tears, begging for forgiveness. How many times had he smothered him with chloroform?
How many times over the years had he hurt him without even realizing it?
Finally in hysterics again, Murdoc shoved his left palm into his forehead, choking on sobs as tears spilled freely, watching the ceiling go black in his peripherals. His knees failed him after fighting to keep him upright ever since he had first seen Hannibal’s new body, and they cracked against the tile, spiraling pain right through his legs. His broken arm dangled at his side as he covered his face with his good forearm, weeping for all of the pain he’d ever caused anyone else. Wept for Russel, who he had stolen and forced to play drums for all these years; wept for 2D, who had only ever wanted a token of his love but got a lifetime of hostility instead; wept for his little girl, who had trusted him to get her off of that fucking island safely and give her a bit of a break, only to have her burn in a fiery death.
The shadows disappeared and the Boogieman reformed, taking steps closer to his little brother, who no longer cared enough to fight back or peel himself off of the floor. It was almost sad, looking at him in his strangely innocent captain ensemble, white turtleneck and his captain’s hat and his riding pants and of course his authentic Cuban-heeled boots, drenched in his own blood and plastic wrappers from his island and sobbing a mess into his sleeve with his hat off-center. It was enough to send a pang of hurt through Hannibal’s cold, dead heart, and for some reason he found himself not ready to say goodbye.
He approached him slowly, seeing the tiny little boy crying in the corner with blossoming bruises on his precious skin from their father, reaching out to touch his shoulder. As if nothing had changed at all, Murdoc flinched in the exact same way he always did, refusing to lift his head from his sleeve. Blood soaked through his sweater and wet the pads of the Boogieman’s fingers. He moved next to him and knelt down.
The least he could do was comfort him and calm him down so he could go in peace.
Gently taking his hat off and setting it on the floor next to them, the sirens boomed behind the elevator shaft as Plastic Beach finally began to collapse, the center of the room falling through and cement and drywall and everything that composed the plastic palace fell after it, the building’s quaking beginning to still as it gave out on itself. Murdoc only tightened on himself, burying his face even further like a child, his broken arm pulsing and trembling against Hannibal’s exposed ribs. Like old times, Hannibal let his hand slide into the greasy hair, scratching at his scalp again. He could hear his brother hiccup against the fabric just like when they were kids, and he was careful not to let his cape touch the fragile man, pulling it back with his free hand. Murdoc let his weight shift onto his brother, disregarding the rotting flesh and bone. Hannibal just shushed him from behind his mask, reaching for his fringe to pull his wet bangs out of his eyes. He raked them to the side, but Murdoc wouldn’t look up, and Hannibal spoke to him in a gentle voice, telling him it was okay, to relax, to just breathe. It was so loud, and Plastic Beach was crashing down around them, but to Murdoc, it was so, so quiet, the only noise the steady humming of the air conditioner in their window and the occasional tap of a branch against the glass. It smelled of cigarette smoke and booze. His bluebird wasn’t outside tonight; he didn’t know where it was. He smiled for it, though, and hoped that wherever it had chosen to sleep for the night, it was happy.
The alcohol in his system paired with the pain of all of his wounds made his eyelids flutter. He couldn’t hear Hannibal breathing, but it was probably because of how loud his sobs were. Usually he liked to feel the rise and fall of his warm back against his tank top to know that he was there, but the angle he was at tonight didn’t let him do that. That was okay. He was there.
Hannibal still raked and scratched and rubbed, Murdoc beginning to grow quieter. The sirens were brought to a sudden stop as the inside of the shaft began to fall apart, water splashing loudly from the inside as things plunged into the abyss. His body grew heavier, and the pain in his arm and back grew stronger, coaxing him towards the floor as he longed for sleep.
Murdoc freed his face, looking up from his sleeve; his vision was blurred with tears and his eyes weren’t adjusted yet from the pressure. He turned his head to the side to try and find his brother, but when he couldn’t find him, he closed his eyes. He could still feel the gentle fingers through his hair, but at a different angle now, and sleep felt closer than ever. He still quietly sobbed, blobs for tears pooling at his jawline and dripping onto his bloodstained pants.
Hannibal never let up. Playing with his little brother’s hair until his head bobbed, he held his breath as he outstretched his arms. It was a lot harder than he had hoped it was going to be.
But he was in pain. He was hurt. He probably wouldn’t make it anyway.
Cape out, the Boogieman knelt forward and wrapped his arms around his baby brother, chin on the crown of his head. He held him tightly, feeling his body begin to go slack as seconds ticked by, black smoke clouding from under the mess of fabric. He heard Murdoc's poisoned lungs gasp for air in panic, his broken nose whistling as he struggled quietly. His sobs, while nearly muted, grew in fear, the Boogieman able to feel tears falling off of his jaw and soaking his tattooed arms. Slowly, quietly, Murdoc began to calm down, his eyelids made of lead, and he found it too tolling to keep them open. He let himself fall backwards further into Hannibal, finding comfort in the familiar warmth. He was home, hurt but alive, hiding under the blankets of his bed and using Hannibal as an anchor. I'm mean, little guy, I know, but for tonight you're safe here. I know, I know, you're mean to me, and I hate you and wish you would leave me be sometimes, but thank you. It breaks my fragile little heart when we scream at each other, and I never really wanted you to know that every time that happens, I run off to an empty room to cry it all out. I've always looked up to you, you know, no matter how hard you hit me; I suppose leaving bruises on each other's skin is how we show affection in this family. It's fine. Thank you for at least being nice on nights like these. I'm so scared and sad and alone all the time, but even though we don't always get along, I'm glad we got to be brothers.
Hannibal held onto him until his sobs turned into hiccups and his hiccups turned into soft breaths and his soft breaths turned into nothing.
I know I don't say it often, but I really do love you, Muds.
The Boogieman held onto his brother until his head fell to the side and the pulse in his arm was no longer there.
He let him go, gently laying him on his side on the chipped tile. Even more of the ceiling fell through, growing dangerously close to where they were. He paid more regard to Murdoc than their father had to him on their couch, reaching down to gently place a hand on his cheek, still warm and wet with tears.
Bringing himself to his feet, the Boogieman closed his cloak, taking one last look at his brother lying on the cold tile. He looked vulnerable again, almost as if he had only been knocked out after Sebastian had struck him too hard. (He had seen that plenty of times before.) Eyelids gently closed, lips slightly parted, skin bruised and bloodied from throwing himself out that goddamned window. Dirty black hair hanging in his eyes and his fucked-up nose Hannibal gave him still boasting scars that looked so fresh as if it just happened. That really was what it looked like--a deep, deep sleep, nursed under by alcohol much like Hannibal was with heroin. Peaceful and innocent, even after a lifetime of crime and bad habit. Asleep in Hannibal's bed when he woke up in the morning, eyes still swollen from the tears the night before. Impossibly baby-faced right in this moment.
The Boogieman felt something turn on his dead insides. He couldn't linger here.
As if nothing had never happened, he dissolved into a cloud of smoke, rising to the ceiling and seeping out of the door to inform his pirates that they were no longer needed.
Everything was taken care of.