((Marco Hart Continued From i))

If Michael had still been with them Marco would have started to suspect the weather was trying to force him into the shirtless club. It was inescapable. He was shivering and miserable near the mouth of the cave with Nick and it'd probably be easier on him if he gave up and hung his shirt to dry somewhere, but that was a step too far. He wasn't ready for anyone to see...anything in that area. Maybe Nick, but there was a good chance someone else would wander by. This place was marked on the map and shelter would be precious in the storm. If they were going to talk to anyone else he wanted to do it without being vividly reminded of...things...every time he looked down. The shirt's white and blue fabric wasn't doing a much better job of keeping up illusions, but it was something.

In a strange way Abe robbing him had been a blessing. The Mountain Dew he'd left behind wasn't Marco's first choice for caffeine, but it would help. He had tried to quit being so reliant a couple times in the last year, and it was always miserable. No less than about half a cup of coffee a day had helped mitigate the symptoms, about 50mg a day and it kept to a dull headache. A couple of drinks a day combined with the ibuprofen in his first aid kit did even better. At that rate the bottle was about half gone. Three more days if he was really strict about it. He had a bottle of Equate Extra Strength Headache Relief for emergencies after that, and that might help keep the pain manageable, but it wouldn't do much for the fatigue. Maybe if they came across somebody who still had some drinks or some caffeine pills on them. Maybe, if he absolutely had to and Nick was okay with it, they could take some supplies without hurting anyone.

Nick stood nearby watching the rain, or watching for someone coming. Marco wondered if he hoped for anyone in particular. Michael. Tristan. Any number of preferable alternatives to Marco. He hated himself for thinking that before the thought even finished, but that didn't send it away. "Do you think we should move back? Someone could see us if they come up."

((Nick Ogilvie Continued From i))

Nick had, in some crude approximation of modesty, put his waistcoat back on, but not his shirt. That was still far too drenched. Had far too many blood splatters and blood stains on it - marks that showed up far more than their faded counterparts on his waistcoat.

Marco was good company.

The announcements had been bad. More deaths. More friends who were killers.

Lorenzo, Violet, Quinn. They were all killers. Nick should have thoughts on them all. But he was being selfish and shut all that out until he heard the two names that he wanted to hear.

Marco. The terrorists had at least acknowledged the, uh, coming out. Nick wasn't sure if the flippant tone made it better or worse for Marco. Wasn't his place to ask. He had made it clear to Marco that he was an open book, always up for talking, always receptive to venting, and there was trust between the two, but not everybody needed to vent. Nick needed to vent. Didn't want it to be one-sided though.

Nick apparently had a thing for attacking throats. Nick should have had some thoughts on that. A bleak quip, maybe, or some amateur psychoanalysis of his own consciousness, or a strategic appraisal of how he'd fought and handled himself thus far. But no. He had nothing.

Nick stopped paying as much attention thereafter. Someone had been poisoned. That sounded...far more premeditated than anything else. He couldn't remember who. Wanted to say Mercy - but as the killer or the victim, Nick wasn't sure, and it was too stupid a question for him to ask Marco.

There should have been chores to do. Survivalist tips and tricks that he should have known. Making impromptu weapons and shelters, hunting and foraging, assembling tools and minor comforts. But after a rudimentary wash and a miserable chunk of his rations, Nick had nothing to do. So he stared.

Marco suggested they move inside.

"Good shout."

He turned and headed deeper into the cave.

The walk to the back felt longer than it was, weighed down by the names they'd heard running in. No time to mull them over in the rain and too much time to do it now. Nick's name had come up of course. Both of his had as well. There was too much to unpack there to dwell on it now.

Others he recognized by reputation alone; Lorenzo, who Emmett and Emil had warned him about two days ago. It made him kinda sick but he was glad neither of their names followed along with Sapphire's. Good guys as far as he could tell. They'd been trying to do the right thing, but with the way they screamed and ran around without any coordination Marco wondered if they had the stomach for it. A pretty weird criticism coming from him, but his credentials followed a few entries after Lorenzo's. Knowing how he felt now, he couldn't shake the feeling that neither of them had it in them to stop anyone permanently. If they kept trying, they were gonna get hurt.

Quinn was another one he'd only heard through rumors, but they stretched way before all of this. Marco had probably met her a couple times, but she scared him to death even before fight. Shauna and Garnet insisted she wasn't so bad, but he could never get over the uneasy feeling that she could snap on any of them at any time. It was proof that even broken clocks were right twice a day that his paranoia had not steered him wrong. It might be worth telling Nick. Who they should avoid had come up yesterday before they went to sleep, and if anybody should top that list by now it was someone like Quinn with multiple kills to their name. There was always a chance that anybody who might jump them for revenge would hesitate. Somebody like Quinn who seemed to be taking the game in a stride might kill them just because they were there.

Data. Marco was good at handling lots of data and turning it into reports. They weren't always good but they at least sounded knowledgeable and that comforted him. Nick didn't seem like the sort of person to find solace in trivia though. He trudged into the darkness with his shoulders slumped. He hadn't been waiting for anyone, or anything, before Marco suggested they move, or if he had he didn't expect them to come anymore. Watching him made every other priority but providing him comfort slough off Marco with the dripping rain.

"Hey, Nick?"

Marco didn't wait for him to finish turning around before he rushed into another hug.

Nick's instincts were on high alert, and for good reason. He had developed a fear that, if he was hugged or tapped on the shoulder or otherwise touched or startled in a way that would have previously been fine, he would actually lash out, by impulse, and hurt someone seriously. Just automatically hurt whoever it was that made the innocent mistake of treating him in a way that would have been fine just a few days ago, even taking into account how introverted and cantankerous he had become. Marco was, right now, the most likely victim of such a calamity.

And that terrified Nick.

Left him riddled with guilt. Sure, it hadn't happened yet. But the capacity for it was there. He could see how it'd play out, down to every little step, but not in a way that would prevent it actually occurring. He knew such a disaster was possible. Because of him. And it was so predictable and yet he felt utterly powerless to stop it.

Thankfully, whether by chance or by design, Marco knew exactly how to hug Nick in a way to disarm any violent reactions. That simple 'hey Nick?' conveyed meaning, reminded Nick that there was no danger, just grounded him generally. Meant that he was able to enjoy the hug. Sure, it came from a tricky angle. Sure, Nick could only wrap one arm around the smaller boy. But still.

It was a hug. It felt good.

"You doing okay, Marco?"

There was something hauntingly familiar about hearing that question in the arms of someone Marco had grown artificially close. A sense memory of pounding music and heartbeats, fancy outfits, punch on his lips, energy pumping through a body he could see slightly in front of him and to the left that insisted on being his despite looking totally alien to him. He remembered, then, how he had hated that question. If you needed to ask it the answer would never be an honest yes, and you could only give so many honest nos about things that no one else could change before they got tired of you. This philosophical road had already been well traveled. Every time it had been asked of him since, he had lied. Unlike most of the other choices he had made there was no alternative scenario where he didn't. It was a reflex. The answers might have been simpler, but their core would not change. There was only one thing he could say when asked 'Are you okay?'

"No." His voice muffled from pressing his face into Nick's side. Before he spoke again he lifted his head towards him. "No, I don't think I am. I don't think you are either. But, but I think that's okay, if that makes sense. We're not supposed to be. If we were okay after all this, it'd say some really bad things, right?" When had his hand started rubbing Nick's back? "I just, you seemed sad, and I thought about how i didn't hear um, everything last time. But I did this time and maybe you were worried I'd be, I dunno, afraid of you, or think less of you, or something." It was warm in here. It was warm everywhere but he was suddenly very aware of how sticky his close felt against his skin. The itch came back. He hadn't felt the itch along those long, faint lines along his arm you could still barely see if the light caught them right since sometime before he left Garnet. Could Nick feel his heart beating? He had to, he could probably hear it, it was so loud in his ears. Kept licking his lips bout his mouth was dry, nothing was coming, his throat was trying to strangle the words before they could pass. "I'm not though. Not, not like that. I'm afraid but not, not like that, I'm always afraid but different that's my fault it's never been yours so you shouldn't feel bad and I'm sorry and."

There was more, probably. Marco couldn't have told you what the sounds he'd made after meant. They ended as quickly as they came, muffled against the fabric of Nick's waistcoat.

He should have stuck with the lie.

Honestly, none of it made sense. Logically, Nick couldn't bring himself to get the worldview Marco was expressing. He thought of himself as a well-educated guy, with the ability to spot deceit and delusions and think critically, able to pick apart the holes in something as a matter of course.

So Nick, on a logical level, trusted his instincts here. Marco had to have been wrong when he said that it was okay to not be okay. That Nick shouldn't feel bad about how Marco was afraid. That Marco didn't think less of Nick. None of it made much sense. It didn't exactly match up with the facts as Nick could - through a still pounding low-key migraine and tiredness and hunger that felt that it had gone on for far longer than it actually had - make them out to be.

And yet, he believed it. Emotionally. Normally Nick knew that bad stuff happened if he just followed his emotions. His impulses were...iffy, at best. Certainly impressionable. But for once, Nick was pretty sure that he would do well to listen to his heart over his head. Accept that there was truth to what Marco was saying, even if Nick couldn't find it if he stopped still and looked around for it. There was ambiguity. Mystery. Normally situations where Nick thrived only if he was in control, and was helpless otherwise.

He could hear Marco's heart beating. Feel his hand rubbing his back. Nick returned the gesture.

Nick nodded. "Yeah. I'm sorry too."

He sighed. Looked down at Marco. "At least we both know what it's like."

"Fuck," Axel muttered uselessly, his voice suddenly audible in his own ears as the cave muted the rain. "Fuck. Fuck."

He didn't remember how he'd gotten here.

He'd found the lake. The right lake, not the stupid bullshit lake, but he must've wound up on the wrong shore since Andy and Abe were nowhere in sight, or maybe they'd fucked off without him already, whatever, couldn't blame them if they had, it had to have been a few hours since he'd left by now. They probably thought he was dead. He felt pretty dead. But he'd seen the waterfall, remembered the map said there was a cave because that sounded like some rad Zelda shit and like there'd definitely treasure or something hidden there which was a stupid thought but he was allowed those every once and a while.

What mattered was it was shelter. He could wait out the worst of the rain—or not, since the dark clouds blanketed the sky, no relief in sight, but maybe it would like die down a little bit, eventually? It was whatever. It was kind of an excuse. He just wanted to sit down and not have rain tapping morse-code rhythms into his skull for a few fucking minutes. His head was killing him.

He had to get back, though. Couldn't stay long. He had the lake now, in front of him, he just had to stay on the shoreline. If he kept walking he'd find their camp, eventually, if they hadn't left. Pretty foolproof even for an idiot.

Problem was he wasn't sure his legs could carry him that far.

His throat was dry, his stomach wrapped in knots, his head pounding. Didn't expect any rando he could run into would be willing to give him some water and maybe like half an energy bar, but the little energy, the adrenaline, that the announcement had shot into his gut had already run out. His hands were trembling as he untied his jacket from his waist, let it hit the floor under him. Pulled his shirt off too, while he was at it, because the cling-wrapped soaking wet fabric felt so, so much worse now that he was out of the rain. Jeans next. Wet denim was rough and smelled terrible and stuck to his legs as he peeled them off. Shoes, socks. He remembered trench foot again.

He eyed the camera perched at the cave entrance for a second and then shuffled out of his boxers anyway. Dignity was overrated, at least compared to not getting some gross-ass fungal infection from letting shit stay damp all day. Wasn't like he was gonna live long enough to have to live down the consequences. Fuck, he could just stay naked for the rest of his life. Wasn't like anyone was gonna stop him. He wasn't gonna do that, but he could.

It was kinda funny. Funny was a good distraction for a few seconds. He glanced further into the cave; it was dark, couldn't see much, but he figured if anyone was here they would have noticed him by now. He piled up his clothes and shoes and started walking toward the back. He'd stay until he'd dried off a bit, dug up a bit more energy.

He hoped they'd waited. If he'd seen his best friend for the last time because he'd been a petulant shitlord and gone off to have the least productive temper tantrum of all time he'd never fucking forgive himself.

The image Marco had held of Nick was pretty clear by now. He'd reflected on the lively energy he associated with him as much as how their circumstances had stolen it from him. Neither the hard partying boisterous heart throb he'd known and the somber killer he knew encompassed what he was expressing in the dark. Gentle wasn't a word that would have sprung to mind before they came here and shouldn't have under hands bathed in no less than three pools of blood, but those small circles against his back were more real than most things he'd felt since waking up here. There was a curious disconnect between experience and sensation in them. He'd been touched like that before. When he was younger his mother would hold him and stroke his back until he calmed, and the coping mechanism had passed to friends who preferred tactile encouragement. Garnet, Zen, Regina-he twitched at her name and moved on before he could remember why- Katelynne and Adele sometimes. Physically the motions were the same, but Marco didn't feel more calm when Nick touched him. He shivered with his pulse pounding in his ears through every stroke. Everything from his breath to his balance was out of whack, if he wasn't holding on he wasn't sure he'd still be upright. Whenever he'd been held like this before he could call it comforting. Nick's fingers stirred something else. They were intimate. Instead of pitiable they found him desirable.

Maybe. He knew he was reading too much into it. If Nick had meant to communicate any of that through minute gestures he wouldn't have thought about it as hard as Marco just had, because people like Nick didn't need to dissect every moment long past its relevancy. His words and actions went straight to the point, consequences could be sorted out afterwards, damn the torpedoes once more into the breach and other mixed metaphors Marco wasn't sure he was remembering exactly right because when Nick looked at him and spoke obliquely of the experience they shared his head filled with all the ones he hadn't, all the things Marco had never and probably would never get to do unless they kept hurting themselves and other people like this and he wondered just really really quickly what it would be like to take action without thinking to reach out and try to pull Nick down and knock one regret off of his list before their time came and he didn't have to wonder about that for long because his hand was moving through the dark and he could almost feel the bristle of Nick's beard and the only thing he could hear over his own heartbeat was the rain and the faint echo coming from the front of the cave and he froze.

Marco froze mid motion, eyes wide below Nick's. The outstretched hand waved him down to whisper. "S-someone's coming. I heard, I'm sure I heard a voice..."

A warning. That was all, hesitant because of fear of discovery. It didn't have to be anything else. Nick would never know.

Nick was bad at comforting people. Not least when he was in a state himself. Which, these days, seemed to be more often than not. But hey, there was something easy about comforting Marco. If Nick had to guess as to what it was - and his mind did not linger on that particular chain of thought long enough to give much thought to whether it was accurate or not - it was because they both had pretty similar needs right now. Nick was sorta comforting himself at the same time as he was comforting Marco. They were helping each other. A fundamentally selfish take on what Nick was like, but one that Nick could believe quite easily.

But such privacy, as mutually beneficial as it was and as much as it helped both Nick and Marco by keeping them out of harm's way and depriving them of opportunities to get into more unwanted bouts of violence with others, was never going to last long. The island was deceptively cosy. A location such as a cave beneath the waterfall was too good to be true. Designed to attract those seeking shelter from the elements, or hope that they might be the first to think of solitude in such a cliched place that, danger zone status in mind, was guaranteed to start off the day empty.

Marco heard the arrival first. Or at least had the wit to recognise it came from a new person rather than either of them or inside their own heads. Nick looked up, in the direction of the entrance to the cave.

"Stay behind me," Nick muttered, pausing only to prep his dagger. It was close quarters. If it was a melee fight, he had the advantage. If the other person had a gun...well, maybe it wouldn't be ready to fire, or aimed at the entrance. He moved forward, as quietly as he could being a large and shaky idiot without a hint of subtlety in his system. He moved forward, slowly, until the new arrival came into view.

Axel naked was a sight he was familiar with. Not in this circumstance, though.

"A-Axel?" Nick asked, remembering a second too late that, like everyone else Nick had once counted as a friend, that same friendship now gave Axel the casus belli needed to justifiably attack Nick on sight.

Nick.

So, so fucking stupid.

A face appeared in the dark, and a voice, and both were pretty impossible to mistake. Axel's body got the picture while his brain was still frozen, blankly trying to recall why adrenaline was pumping into his limbs, why his fight or flight reflex was turned up to eleven, it's just Nick, right, we're friends, ish. Used to be friends, good enough. Right? Yeah? He fumbled for his pocket, for his knife, except he didn't have pockets at the moment and he also didn't have his knife and Nick killed two people and could he take Nick, like, without a weapon? He had arms and fists attached to them and they tensed again with that coiled-spring energy and

He was already stepping backwards because he couldn't. Adrenaline filled him and once it was gone he'd have nothing. Nick could crush him like a bug. He had to go.

He had to run.

He had to run.

He slipped, feet wet on the slick stone beneath him, he fell with an ugly thud.

He had to run.

He had to run.

He had to run.

He was paralyzed, his shoulders shaking, he could not cry at a time like this, fuck, but the adrenaline didn't take him off the ground. He tried to slide backward but found his arms and their coiled-spring energy wobbled like jello at the prospect of supporting his weight. Pathetic. His heartbeat caught somewhere high in his throat.

This was how he was gonna die, huh? Naked and wet. Good jokes, universe.

He didn't say anything.

Nick's sudden protectiveness would have sent him swooning if it'd leapt off his screen. While he wasn't exactly about to argue with it now though, it range kind of naive. Naivete had to be blatant for Marco to be the one calling it out, even mentally, but when you considered what they had both done Marco didn't need to stay cowering in the back. It was noble, but before Marco had finished processing Nick was trying to keep him safe his hands were inside his bags fastening the glove back on. Whoever had intruded on the cave could just be looking for a place to stay dry, but if seeing the two of them prompted anything but running away they had to be prepared for the worst. If anyone tried to hurt Nick, he wouldn't hide in the back of the cave hoping that he made it out okay.

Marco would slit their fucking throats himself.

That.

Came out a little stronger than expected.

Put a pin in for later.

His fist clenched tight, the light sound of metal scraping together echoing behind them underneath Nick's surprised voice. That name jogged his memory faster than his eyes did, but in his defense Axel's current state of affairs was...distracting. Marco didn't know him all that well and certainly had never thought about him like that. The reputation he'd cultivated pushed any fantasies out of Marco's head quickly. Imagining Axel as anything but a snarling blur of fists and gnashing teeth didn't feel right. He bristled as soon as the other boy started to move, ready to stand with Nick even if Axel, uh, spectacularly collapsed with a high pitched yelp in a puddle he probably made himself.

Oh.

Okay then. Marco's shoulders relaxed. His eyebrows knit together, glancing up to Nick for direction.

Axel was scared of him.

That made sense. Nick hated to admit that it made sense, but it did. Even putting aside Nick's newly earned reputation - that made his image back home seem quaint and tame in comparison - there was an undeniable power imbalance in this whole situation. Axel was naked. Nakedness was a synonym for vulnerability and defencelessness for good reason. He had no pockets in which he could be hiding a weapon, no tricks up his sleeves, nothing of the sort. Nick had all those advantages and then the knife. And an ally, too. In a situation such as this, which invited kids to exploit whatever fortuitous advantage they had as mercilessly as possible, getting caught so unaware, stumbling into danger, was rightly terrifying.

And then there was Nick's reputation.

The announcements made it sound bad. So bad that even Nick was unsure about his own more...sympathetic recollection of events. But Nick didn't like being thought of as having a flaw that he didn't have, and so it was with righteous indignation that, whenever the opportunity came, he would clear his name. But Axel wasn't calling him out. Wasn't ranting at him. Flinging insults. Those thoughts might have been had in his mind, but Axel was just...scared. Petrified. Fixed to the spot by a crippling fear, Nick realised. It didn't make him angry. Just...sad. That he could be seen as so horrendous, so monstrous.

A wet and timid Axel completely naked would, any other time, have essentially been the stuff of Nick's dreams. A crude thought for the moment, but a true one. One that made the dismal reality suck all the more in comparison.

Nick blinked. He sighed. He lowered the knife.

"I...I ain't gonna hurt you, Axel."

So Axel wasn't dead. That was pretty cool.

The worst of the fear was dissipating pretty quickly, and there was a real good reason for that. Nick wasn't, like, a super thoughtful kinda dude? Especially when he was pissed, but honestly like, in general, guy's mouth and fists and dick all got him into different sorts of trouble cause he moved before his brain caught up with him and hey, where had he heard that before? He was a real familiar breed of dumbass. Thing about being that particular breed of dumbass, though, was it was predictable, especially if you were one of them yourself. And looking up at Nick, with him just standing there, knife hanging loosely from his hand⁠—

That knife would be in his throat by now if Nick wanted to kill him. Which would be kind of a cool mental image if it wasn't happening to him? It was kind of a sweet knife. Nice reminder that he'd been saddled with an angry tentacle and its butter knife. Probably not the best time for a dick measuring contest, even though he was totally dressed for it.

His expression softened from terror to anxiety tinged with confusion, especially since he suddenly noticed Nick wasn't alone, which again, would be more concerning if cave squad member #2 was pouncing on him or whatever. They seemed like they were looking at Nick for instruction, though, which was heartening assuming Nick didn't suddenly change his mind. He... had no clue who the other person was, honestly. Their face seemed familiar but in such a vague roundabout sorta way that he could guess names for half an hour and he'd probably get it wrong.

They seemed cool with Nick, though. Nick who murdered two people? That Nick? So that was... suspicious, maybe. Well, he'd only murdered one person, according to Abe, "only" being the operative term and fucking joke here.

... Axel took a second to grab the bundle of clothing he'd dropped when he slipped and blanket it neatly over his crotch. One problem solved.

"Cool. I mean, I'm good with that. You, like, not stabbing me, I mean." He rolled his shoulders back with an audible pop. Eyes back on Nick, the murderer. He should be pissed, right? He would be pissed, probably, if he wasn't so tired, and if he couldn't be reduced to meat and blood on the cave floor in ten seconds if he wasn't Nick's preferred level of chill.

What would he do if he was pissed, anyway? He didn't know the dude Nick had popped off on. He wasn't out for revenge. He wasn't a vigilante searching for justice. He just kinda wanted an explanation, and maybe like some water, that would be nice.

"So, uh." He held his clothes in one hand and tried to push his body up with the other. Jello arms, still. Shit. "Sorry for interrupting your whatever it is you're doing in here, I guess." He glanced back at the other person. "Sorry, uh, don't think I know your name?"

Honestly, all the rationalizing he was doing to himself could only do so much to hide that he was still pretty fucking nervous.

This was wrong. It just wasn't possible that someone could relax so easily around them, especially someone like Axel. Axel didn't do calm, not by any gossip Marco had ever heard. Nick was calm too though; they must have known each other, but Marco couldn't remember him in the groups he drove home. A lot of the faces were fuzzy, there were usually a couple people max who were sober enough to give him directions. Still somebody like Axel would have stood out, right? So where else could they know each other?

The softness in Nick's tone spoke to a different part of his own reputation. That had to be coincidence, though. Sweet talking a guy like Axel, who chased every girl slow enough for him to catch? Throw in his temper and that could only lead to the one-two of a slug and a slur headed Nick's way. Instead Axel was nervous, but he wasn't causing any trouble. There had to be more to it.

Marco wondered if he was really alone, or if he was just buying time until back-up arrived.

His voice and expression were flat when he responded. "You wouldn't. It's Marco." Marco's eyes had already traveled over Axel's shoulder to the path behind him, and they didn't return when he spoke.

Axel still didn't trust him. That hurt. Nick knew it made sense. Nick knew that Axel would be looking up at him with a mix of fear, contempt, betrayal, and well-founded loathing. Nick and Axel were friends, and that meant a certain tolerance, perhaps even an affinity, for the flaws of the other, but this was something beyond the pale. Unless by some random chance Axel had encountered one of the people who knew the truth about Beryl's death, Axel would think Nick is a double-killer - and worse still, the sort of person settling old scores, the sort of vile and repugnant human being who would kill an ex-girlfriend without provocation. That just...that wasn't acceptable. It made him not just a murderer, but some vicious perpetrator of gendered violence.

Instead, he was a mercy-killer. Which raised its own questions, but they were different.

And even if Axel knew about Beryl, that still left Jeremiah's death. Danya had made Nick sound like a calculating killer with a penchant for attacking throats. Sure, the reality of that situation, that Jeremiah attacked Nick without knowing the true circumstances of Beryl's death and had therefore died in vain, was eminently plausible once the facts about Beryl's death were established. But that wouldn't get rid of all doubt. Axel wasn't some gullible, jejune idiot. He would be foolish to take anyone completely at their word right now, without deploying his critical faculties at all. Nick knew that. Nick accepted that. It was for the best for Axel to take that view. But goddamn it, Nick still hated it. It still made Nick feel so...exposed.

Nick sniffed. He hadn't started crying yet, but Nick knew that it would happen sooner or later. A headache - a low throbbing ache from where Jeremiah had struck him - returned. He grimaced, trying to think past the vexing pain flaring up in his synapses.

Marco introduced himself. Nick thought briefly about telling Axel of Marco's deadname, just to eliminate confusion, but decided against it. That was Marco's decision to make. Nick instead focused on his own difficulties. He looked at Axel. "Someone shot Beryl. She was paralysed." God, the words still hurt. "There was no hope for her. I was the only person who had the guts to do anything for her, and no matter what you think about euthanasia or mercy killing or whatever the fuck it was, it was not murder. And Jeremiah thought it was, and he attacked me, because Jeremiah likes to hit me first, and...yeah."

Nick looked at Axel. Pleadingly. Desperately. Axel was a friend. Axel was someone he had fun with. He understood Axel, Axel understood him. They had that sort of dynamic back home. Nick needed Axel to believe him now. To make it all...not worth it, but bearable for a little bit longer. He couldn't quite say why, but he did.