Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Every relationship has flaws. Every single one. Swindler didn’t have many complaints about her boyfriend. Although sometimes there was something...but even then, that was something they worked on...for the most part.

“I’m home!”

“Welcome home, angel.”

Swindler managed to close the door behind her while holding the box of donuts in one hand and her backpack in the other, and Cutthroat popped his head from the kitchen to greet her.

“I brought back the donuts you wanted! I got the ones topped with marshmallow, your favorite.”

Cutthroat beamed, but then his expression quickly turned dark. Oh boy, here we go...

“Thank you...but tell me... Did you know it takes 15 minutes for you to get home from work?”

“Um…”

“And today you took 17 minutes... Do you mind explaining where you were in those two minutes…? Were you perhaps… with someone else?”

At this moment, Cutthroat fully stepped out of the kitchen, showing off the meat-bloodied knife he was holding. Swindler had to resist the urge to groan a little. Didn’t he listen to what she’d just said?

Putting the donut box down on the counter, she found herself saying, “Well, I was picking up donuts...don’t you think that would take some time?”

“Oh!” Cutthroat’s expression brightened once again to the same smile as before, as if nothing happened. “I see! That’s okay then,” he said, wrapping her in a tight hug.

Okay, now I feel a little guilty since Hacker did give me his leftover donuts…

She flinched a little as she felt his hug tighten. “So wait…” Cutthroat’s voice came out dark once again, and Swindler could feel herself rolling her eyes. “....you were with Hacker?”

Hell, did I say that out loud?

“You did. Now mind explaining yourself?” The hug tightened even more.

“We were just talking, we ran into each other at the donut shop. He wanted to vent about some customers who he found even dumber than usual. That’s it. You know we’re friends.”

“Hmm..” Cutthroat started to pout, “I know that he’s not a rival, but that doesn’t stop me from being jealous! Plus,” he pulled out of the hug to look pleadingly at Swindler, “that means he took a few precious moments that you could have spent with me instead.”

“But,” she said, “this also means we have a wonderful dessert for after dinner!”

Finally, it seemed Swindler was in the clear when Cutthroat once again smiled gleefully and started to bounce a little at the thought of sweets. It was actually very cute, if you ignored the bloody knife he was still holding.

“I suppose if Hacker is the one that gives us marshmallow doughnuts, he’s not so bad!”

Every relationship has its flaws, and theirs was no exception. But, that was fine. She loved him, crazy side and all.

Chapter Text

“Okay, you’ll be meeting my brother, who is VERY particular, so you have to be on your best behavior!” 

“Okaaay!”

“And he's also in law enforcement, so you can’t do ANYTHING incriminating!”

“Okaaay!”

“And also, no knives.”

Cutthroat rested his hands on Swindler’s where they were fumbling with his tie, and gave her a smile. “It’ll be okay, angel, relax a little. I promise I’ll be good.” Swindler was still tense with anxiety, but she tried her best to calm down. 

Thinking of Cutthroat finally meeting her brother, Swindler couldn’t help but remember how she had met her boyfriend in the first place.

A year and a half ago:

“I hate to break this to you, but I think you have a stalker.”

“Wha..? No way, I think he’s just in need! He might be homeless...”

Hacker did not look convinced at all.

“Did he look homeless?”

“W-Well, it’s not good to generalize how people look and act just because of one aspect of themself! You shouldn’t stereotype people, you know!”

“Answer the question.”

“....No, he didn’t really look homeless, but I shouldn’t judge!”

“You’re hopeless. I could always check the security cameras at your apartment-”

“That’s illegal! ”

“That’s why it’s fun!” 

Swindler leaned back in her chair tiredly. Hacker continued to munch on his fourth donut, but after a moment, he set what remained down and stared at Swindler seriously.

“But really, Swindler, you can’t always give the benefit of the doubt to everybody. This might not seem serious to you, but having a stalker is very serious, and potentially dangerous.”

Swindler wilted a little under his gaze, feeling a bit reprimanded. “I suppose I can change my locks or something.” 

“That’s a good idea, but we need to do something more drastic. Maybe invest in some trash can locks, like the kind you get for raccoons or something.”

“That’s rude! Plus, he would probably be able to unlock those anyway!”

Hacker’s eyebrows managed to raise even higher. “That...doesn’t sound harmless at all. Should I call your brother about this?” 

“NO!” Swindler suddenly slammed her hands to the table, making Hacker’s doughnut bounce a little on his plate. “Don’t call him! I don’t want him to worry. And besides…” Swindler faltered for a moment. “I-I can handle it myself! I don’t need someone to take care of all of my problems!” 

“This isn’t just a problem , Swindler, this is potentially a huge invasion of privacy and safety.”

“I can take care of it, I’m not a kid anymore! Speaking of which,” Swindler snatched the rest of Hacker’s doughnut (“Hey!”) and took a bite, “why am I getting scolded by you?! You’re younger than me!”

“By only like two years!”

“By TWO YEARS!”

In retaliation, Hacker grabbed Swindler’s donut, which she had only taken one or two bites out of.

“Hey!”

He smirked as he took a large bite. “Karma.” 

She groaned and rolled her eyes, moving her backpack closer to her. 

Before visiting Hacker, she’d stopped by the store.

She’d picked up strawberry shampoo, for the “homeless” man. She’d found him digging around in her garbage a couple days in a row now, and every time she stopped and asked him why on earth he was rooting around in there, he would just grin at her and say she shouldn’t worry about it, all sing-songy, what a strange guy. But the other day, something different happened.

“Um...can I help you? You know if you need something, you don’t have to go through people’s garbage for it.”

The strange, white-haired man turned around upon hearing Swindler call out to him, and his eyes sparkled when they met hers.

“Oh! You’re just the person I was hoping to see! There actually is something you can help me with!”

“W-What is it..:?”

“What kind of shampoo do you use?” he asked, purple eyes glittering. 

Swindler was taken aback, taking a step backwards. “Huh..!?”

“Like, what scent do you use? I keep trying to guess, but I can’t seem to figure it out!”

“It’s um.... It’s strawberry,” she said, still confused. 

“ That’s what it is!” The man bounced in place, clapping excitedly. “Thanks, that really helped!” With that, the man put the lid back on the trashcan, picked up a few choice items he decided to keep from it (were they...an empty shampoo bottle and a bit of hair from when she trimmed her bangs….?), and was about to leave, when Swindler got the nerve to finally say: “Um! I was wondering, since I see you doing...that… sometimes, if you need any help? I mean, like, help with groceries or with personal items! You know…?” 

The man stopped in his tracks, and turned back around to look at her. “No, I don’t need any help with that. But you’re very kind to ask.” Something about him seemed to darken, and he fully turned around to walk a bit closer to her.

“ That’s what I love so much about you. ”

Swindler felt her face go a bit red, letting out a little “meep!” sound, but before she could recover and ask what he meant, the man turned around again, and left.

Why....did my heart pound like that when he said that…?

She decided to brush it off as embarrassment, surprise. Isn’t that what anyone would feel if a stranger just told them they loved them? But for clear reasons, this was something she absolutely could not tell Hacker, he would call her brother in a split second. 

Also...why did he look somewhat familiar? She could’ve sworn she’d seen him before, but where ? 

She was so lost in thought on her way home that she barely even registered that he was there before walking directly into him. 

“Hello there, angel!”

A-Angel?!

“Yes! It’s my new nickname for you, I’ve decided, since you’re so kind, and have such lovely pink highlights, and…!” He leaned down, their faces getting close , “...because you’re so beautiful.”

Swindler’s face burst into flames, both at the compliments and the closeness, and for accidentally speaking her thoughts out loud.

“I…” Her tongue felt like concrete in her mouth, she felt like she couldn’t form words properly. “I got you something!” she said in an attempt to calm down.

“You did?” The man looked intrigued, and excited.

“Yes! Here!” She fumbled for her backpack, unzipping it unsteadily, before practically shoving the bottle of shampoo into his chest. Their hands touched. “You-you seemed to need it!”

The man stared down at the bottle for a long time, and Swindler was starting to sweat from the tension, before he broke into a big smile, cradling the bottle in his chest, almost like the bottle was something precious. “This is the best gift anyone has ever gotten me, thank you. It’s even red!”

He said it so genuinely, Swindler felt a pang of compassion, and something else. Did no one give him a gift before, did he have anyone that could give him one? She found herself making a mental note to try to get more things for him, even if they were small.

They stood there like that for a long time, Swindler feeling emotions she couldn’t quite place, and Cutthroat feeling unimaginably happy that he received the first gift from his love. Unbeknownst to them, Hacker was watching from the security camera.

“Goddammit, Swindler.”

But as he observed more, he thought the guy looked familiar. Had he seen that face before? 

Slowly, an idea dawned on him. “Oh hell,” he muttered as he started sifting through the local court records before finally hitting the topic he’d had in mind. Cold trickled down his spine as he read. “ It’s him .”

The defendant from the murder trial Swindler had complained about being on jury duty for. The one she’d confided in Hacker that she thought was self defense. The one where she was the jury member that convinced the rest of the jury to vote Not Guilty.

Hacker darted for his phone, placing a call and not bothering to type out a text message.

“What the hell? Haven’t I told you to never call me? I’m busy.”

“Courier, we have a situation.”

Chapter Text

Although Hacker had known Courier for quite some time now, that didn’t mean he couldn’t be intimidated by him sometimes. Especially when he was ticked off, and when it concerned his sister. 

It had only been about two minutes since the phone call ended, and Hacker could already hear the rumble of Courier’s motorcycle and the squealing of wheels jerking to a stop against the pavement. It wasn’t long until Courier was slamming Hacker’s front door open, and without so much as a “hello,” snapped, “Explain. Now .”

Hacker simply rolled away from his monitors, allowing Courier to take a look at the hacked surveillance camera’s footage. He had recorded the footage, and it was currently paused on Swindler and Cutthroat, the latter cradling a shampoo bottle to his chest and the former clutching her backpack. They were a bit close for comfort in Hacker’s opinion, and much too close for Courier.

There was dead silence for almost an entire minute before Courier spoke Hacker’s thoughts aloud better than he could phrase them: “What the fuck?” 

The near mind reading almost made Hacker laugh despite the situation. Schooling his expression, Hacker replied, “It seems your sister is being romanced by a garbage-digging stalker.”

“So it seems.” Courier was grinding his teeth so loudly, Hacker sent out a silent prayer for his dentist.

Before Hacker could even attempt to show more footage, Courier was already on his way out. “Don’t tell me you’re going to try to confront her now ,” he said. 

“Of course I am,” Courier replied. “I’m going to try to get her to change her locks, or better yet, move to a different apartment.”

Hacker blinked. Moving seemed a tad extreme even in this situation. 

“You know she isn’t going to stand for that. I’m not the most law-abiding of citizens, but I think it may be best to let law enforcement handle this. You know, your job . Maybe we can talk her into getting a restraining order.” Hacker knew that this would probably have the best chance of appealing to Courier, but internally he felt even this would be unlikely. Swindler and Cutthroat were already too close, already had too much contact. From what he could tell, she had already lowered her guard and level of wariness far too much. Trying to separate the two at this point would be difficult. 

Of course, Hacker didn’t say any of this to Courier. Courier was usually reasonable, but when it came to his little sister, he tended to let his emotions get the best of him. It would probably be for the best to let them talk to each other, let them work it out between siblings. 

“We don’t have time to get a whole fucking investigation team and restraining order, this needs to end now. I won’t just sit on my ass while my sister could be in danger.”

Hacker couldn’t truly argue with him; while his feelings on the matter weren’t quite as intense, he did agree with him after all. Besides, while they did talk on occasion, they could only be considered “friends” because of their closeness towards Swindler. Without her, there wasn’t much between them, and Courier rarely listened to him, anyway. He didn’t have a right to intrude on family matters.

“Just…try to listen to her side of it, too, okay? She’s an adult now and can make her own decisions.”

“Adult or not, I’m not letting her get hurt because of something stupid.” I care too much about her to let that happen . And with that, Courier stalked back out of Hacker’s apartment, leaving Hacker with his thoughts once again.

Courier was planning on giving his sister an earful on talking to (garbage-digging) strangers, potential stalkers, and her kindness being taken advantage of, but as soon as he stepped into her apartment with his spare key, he felt all that resolve dry up in the back of his throat. He could hear her crying . Everything he was planning to say fell apart in his mind, the only thing remaining being finding Swindler, comforting her, and then destroying what made her cry in the first place .

His body moved on its own, navigating her apartment, until he found her crying in her bedroom, sitting on the floor, clutching an envelope in her hand. Courier immediately went to her side, kneeling down beside her. “What happened? What’s wrong?”

She sniffed violently and wiped her eyes. “It...it’s…” she shuddered into fresh tears before she could finish her sentence. 

Courier’s eyes went to the letter clutched tightly in her hand. Although teardrops did obscure some of the type, he could understand just enough. “Another delay?” he asked gently. Swindler could only let out another sob, and buried her face in Courier’s jacket. As she continued to sniffle, and eventually nod off from exhaustion and crying, Courier stroked the back of her head and thought about what he originally came here for. Now wasn’t the time to confront her about that, not when yet another roadblock to her adopting her younger siblings had come up. It would have to wait, at the very least until she woke up and was emotionally stable enough to discuss it.

Supporting her sleepy body with his left hand and stabilizing with his weaker, right arm, Courier tucked Swindler into bed, and went to the kitchen. He knew that when she was stressed, she often forgot to eat. The least he could do was make sure that wouldn’t be the case when she woke up.

He opened her cupboard and fridge, analyzing what she already had in the house before deciding on something a little special: pancakes. She even had some syrup and fruit as potential toppings. Courier started whisking together the batter, watching as the pan heated up on the stove, and thought about what he was going to say. They would talk after she woke up and had something in her stomach; he would wait as long as he needed, as long as it meant his little sister would be safe. He just wasn’t sure how to approach the topic… maybe I should call Hacker again for advice, he thought. He’ll never let me live this down . 

Chapter Text

In the end, he didn't end up talking to Swindler about it at all. As soon as she woke up and shuffled into the kitchen, with puffy eyes and still sniffling, Courier knew he couldn’t bring himself to make her upset again. Seeing Swindler timidly smile and start to eat was a balm to Courier’s soul, and the thought of ruining that was impossible. Fuck, I always knew I was too soft on her . But even that acknowledgement wasn’t enough. Especially when she started to make coffee for the two of them. If she wasn’t so genuinely kind and sweet, he’d be sure she was a master manipulator. 

The coffee and Swindler’s improving mood distracted Courier, to the point that it was only after he finally got back home that he realized he completely forgot to bring up the “garbage-digging stalker” issue. He hadn’t even asked Hacker for advice...although that was probably a good thing, he reasoned, since now Hacker didn’t have anything to hold over his head. 

And with that, Courier promptly forgot about the whole ordeal. Hacker didn’t bring more updates after that first call, so he assumed, maybe the issue took care of itself. Or maybe Hacker took care of it for me.  

Now, he was kicking himself. Because now , one and a half years later, Swindler wants him to meet her new boyfriend at a nice restaurant, and who does he see next to her?

Courier nearly knocked over his chair in surprise and rage, pointing an accusatory finger at the previously-known garbage stalker. “ YOU. ”

Said garbage stalker’s eyes lit up in recognition, why the fuck does he look EXCITED to see me!? I’m about to wring his neck. “Oh! You’re the nice detective man that interrogated me! It’s so good to see you again!” 

Something clicked in Courier’s mind as he suddenly realized he didn’t just recognize the man from the surveillance camera footage, but also from a court case not too long ago...

Swindler stiffened beside him, a terrible realization dawning on her. How could she not have foreseen this, they may have already met before! She didn’t want to think too deeply about the circumstances of the two mens’ first meeting.

Awkwardly, she managed to sputter out, “Um-ah...uh, I take it you two have already met?” She winced at her choice of words.

“Yes!” “ What the fuck. ” They spoke at the same time, and Swindler could feel herself sweat even more. Oh boy.

“Let-let’s not make a scene! Here, let’s just siiiit down, niiice and easy.. Let’s all just calm down!” She gently corralled her boyfriend to the chair opposite of her brother. Courier let out a growl, but Swindler gave him a pleading look, and he reluctantly let it go and slumped back into his chair. That didn’t stop him from giving him the dirtiest look he could muster, while Cutthroat’s pleasant smile never faltered. Swindler then took a seat beside them both on the third side of the square table, in the middle of the two men.

“Now I know you may have had your differences in the past-” (“Differences doesn’t even begin to cover it,” Courier grumbled, and Swindler gave him a light kick to the shin to shut him up), “-but we should all try to get along now! Let’s just put that behind us, and order something.” Cutthroat easily grinned and picked up the menu, scanning the desserts, but Courier wasn’t having it.

“Just give us a moment, please,” he sneered at the man opposite him (Cutthroat gave him a cheery wave), and pulled Swindler away from the table. Once they were far enough away from the table, he turned towards her and snapped, “Mind telling me what the hell has been going on with you?”

Swindler shuffled her feet, her fingers nervously pulling at each other: she hated when Courier was unhappy with her. “I’m sorry… I didn’t realize you two already knew each other…”

“That’s not the fucking issue here, Swindler! The issue is that that man has not only been stalking you for the better part of a year, but has also almost gone to prison! Fucking prison! for MURDER! ” 

“It was self-defense!”

“Are you fucking sure about that?! Need I remind you of the details…”

Swindler suddenly snapped her head up to look her brother in the eye. “Yes I’m sure! I was part of the jury for the court ruling , for goodness sake! I know you have your doubts about him, and I don’t blame you for that, but the thing is I trust him! I care about him! Please, just give him a chance; just try, for me? If you trust me, will you please just try to get along with him?”

Courier gave a deep sigh and ran his prosthetic hand through his hair. “Fucking- fine. ONLY for you. But if he tries any funny business, I swear to fucking God-” 

He was interrupted by Swindler squealing and hugging him tightly. “Thank you!! I knew you were the best!” Courier couldn’t help but feel his iciness melt just a little at that, and allowed Swindler to fuss over his hair and slightly-wrinkled suit, and drag him back to the table where Cutthroat was waiting. 

“Sorry, I already ordered mine! I couldn’t resist~” (“Wow that’s rude-” Courier stage-whispered to Swindler, who elbowed him in the gut saying, “Bold of you to say!”). 

“That’s great!” she replied overly cheerfully, probably to make up for Courier. “We just need a few more moments-”

Courier was already ordering coffee. 

“You need more than that,” she found herself chiding him. 

“I’ll do what I want. And need I remind you, I’m the older sibling here.” Courier smirked as Swindler gave him a half-hearted huff of annoyance, before turning back to her own menu. 

Everything seemed to be going much smoother after the initial meeting, Cutthroat cheerfully making conversation and Courier responding in a minimally-rude fashion (Swindler was proud of his effort). Their food came and everything actually seemed to be going great, Swindler thought! Pleased with how everything was going, she didn’t think twice when she excused herself for a moment to use the restroom. As soon as she was gone, the atmosphere between the two men completely changed.

“I don’t know what the hell you want with my sister, but if you even LOOK at her the wrong way I will fucking end you.”

“Don’t think that I’ll show you mercy just because you’re her older brother,” Cutthroat’s eyes glinted dangerously as his fingers ran across his steak knife’s handle, “no one will get between me and my angel.”

“ Angel?” Courier almost choked. The table creaked dangerously under Courier’s grip. “Oho, it’s on, fucker- ”

“I’m back!”

In a flash, everything was back to the way it was before Swindler left. Courier was frowning, yes, but that wasn’t unusual, and the playful light returned to Cutthroat’s eyes. 

“Welcome back, angel!”

Courier’s eye twitched, but he did his best to hide it as he took another sip of coffee. It was his third cup. 

This is going surprisingly well, Swindler thought to herself. They’re both finally behaving…

“So,” Courier  found himself saying, “How did you two…” No, I already know how they met. “What was your first date like?”

Swindler froze, a nervous smile on her face. Serves me right for speaking so soon…

“Oh, it was wonderful! My angel and I went to this new cafe, and I ordered this wonderful cheesecake for her! She looked so happy eating it.” Cutthroat let out a lovestruck sigh, his hands cupping his face like a schoolgirl with a crush. 

“W-Wait a minute,” Swindler stammered, “I went to that cafe myself! You were the stranger who ordered that cheesecake for me?!”

“Oh silly, we went together! I even paid your parking meter for you!”

“ That was you?!”

Courier flagged down a waiter and ordered a shot of whiskey. The moment he had it, he poured the whole thing into his coffee and took a large gulp. He was going to need it. 

Swindler knew that before they officially met, Cutthroat had already, um, had an eye on her, but she didn’t realize that all those times she found spare change magically in her wallet when she needed it, or when her parking meter was filled by a kind stranger, or all those times a mysterious person bought a drink or dessert for her, it had been Cutthroat the whole time. What else didn’t she know? He wasn’t the secretive type, but at the same time, he didn’t go out of his way to tell her things she may not know. I guess that’s something we’ll need to work on , she supposed. 

The rest of the dinner went by with minimal...shocking revelations. After that bombshell of a question, Courier behaved himself (whether out of pity for his sister or the whiskey working its magic, who can say), and Cutthroat distracted himself with holding Swindler’s hand and eating his fluffy dessert. By the time they left, Courier was even (reluctantly) willing to shake Cutthroat’s hand! Swindler was unbelievably proud of the effort they were making to get along, if only for her sake. 

On their way home, Swindler and Cutthroat linked arms, Swindler giving her boyfriend a kiss on the cheek. Cutthroat’s smile rivalled the sun.

“Now that I’ve met your brother, I think you should meet my sister!”

“Oh, I didn’t realize you had a sister…! I would love to!” Swindler smiled, thinking, Maybe she’s a bit more normal than Cutthroat, this shouldn’t be so bad!

But when she almost got stabbed in the forehead by a flying scalpel, she realized she had made a mistake in underestimating Cutthroat’s family.

Chapter Text

It had been a busy, stressful day at the hospital, so many incompetent idiots screwing up and the patients...the patients were as annoying as usual. Doctor had been planning on spending her evening watching shitty medical soap operas and laughing at all the inaccuracies while drinking her favorite wine. She’d been looking forward to this all week, saving the best wine for the end of her work week so she could drink as much as she wanted and not have to wake up for a shift the next day. 

Everything was going fine .

Doctor was finally nestled into her blanket on the couch, plate of cheeses on the coffee table and a glass of wine in hand, when she spotted movement in the darkness out of the corner of her eye. She jerked her head to catch what it was.

There was nothing there.

Narrowing her eyes suspiciously, she slowly returned back to the glow of the TV. There it was, again, in the dark corner of the living room.

Slowly drawing her scalpel from her bra, Doctor kept her eyes trained on the commercial currently playing on the TV, waiting for the next chance to strike.

Without looking at her target, she aimed and flung the scalpel at her target.

“Wah! O-Ohh my god!”

That wasn’t a familiar voice. Not even a little bit. Preparing herself to rip this intruder a new one for interrupting her self-care time, Doctor briskly flicked on the lightswitch, stalked over to where her first scalpel was lodged in the wall, and readied another scalpel, this time from between her breasts.

“Hiiii, Doctor! I hope you like pie!”

Now this voice was far too familiar. Goddammit . 

“Cutthroat, I swear to God that I will literally murder you. What are you doing in my house. At 11.38 on a Saturday night. ” 

The idiot was still smiling so cheerfully despite her threats. This was when she noticed the source of the unfamiliar voice, sitting down next to him, pale as a sheet.

The unfamiliar girl was much shorter, and trembling like some sort of teacup Chihuahua. She was unsteadily holding a pan of pie, apparently homemade from the looks of it. If she isn’t careful with that shit she’s going to ruin my carpet . 

Because the universe hated Doctor, that’s exactly what happened when her blanket accidentally slipped off, exposing her very revealing lingerie nightgown.

This was going to be a long night.

Unfortunately, the night didn’t go very well for Swindler either. Even after Doctor re-emerged from her bedroom wearing something much more modest, Swindler’s face was still on fire from the mortification of not only seeing someone wearing... that , but also the horrifying embarrassment that it had also been Doctor’s first impression of her. Breaking into her house near midnight, and dropping a pie on her nice carpet while being face level with her nearly-naked body. Swindler could only bury her face in her hands in shame.

“I thought you told her we were coming!” she whisper-shouted at Cutthroat.  

“Oh, I didn’t!” Cutthroat looked much too happy after the damage he’d done to both Swindler’s dignity and reputation. “We’re family, after all!”

“Being family doesn’t mean you don’t tell your family members when you’re bringing someone to meet them! I think it means the opposite, actually!”

“We are not related,” Doctor snapped at him, her golden eyes cold as ice. “When will you drop that?”

“Eh?”

“What do you mean?? Of course you’re like my sister!!”

“I’m not like your sister either!”

“EH?!”

“God, quit it with the noises! Use your big girl words!” Doctor could feel a headache coming on, not only did she have to deal with her self-proclaimed “brother”, she also had to deal with his annoying girlfriend who would not quit making a nuisance of herself. 

Said annoying girlfriend jolted even more upon Doctor snapping at her, slowly turning to Cutthroat.

“You mean to tell me that the person whose house we intruded on in the middle of the night, whose carpet I ruined, who I saw nearly n-n-” Swindler’s face got even redder, if that was possible, “-NAKED! isn’t even your sister?!”

Cutthroat didn’t even seem to register her words, he was glaring at Doctor with a dark look she knew all too well, albeit he’d never made that face over a person before. Before Doctor could blink, Cutthroat had drawn his own knife out of his coat, and had it aimed at her jugular.

“Don’t speak to my angel that way. Apologize.”

Angel ? Doctor had to withhold a visible scoff, knowing full well he could slit her throat easily. She glanced down at the so-called “angel”, her eyes wide and pupils shrunk to almost nothing, stammering as well.

Angel, my ass. This girl is nothing special. 

Grumbling, Doctor relented, as she didn’t feel like getting murdered tonight. “ Fine. Sorry.”

As quickly as the knife appeared, it vanished into his coat, and Cutthroat was once again wearing the same light expression from before. “What did you two even want, coming into my house at this hour?”

“We’re here for dinner!” Cutthroat cheered. Isn’t it a bit late for dinner? Not to mention, all you brought was a pie, did you expect me to feed you?

As if reading Doctor’s mind, Swindler meekly added, “We brought a pie for dinner… I’m so sorry about your carpet…” She winced at the memory. “And also, sorry for coming so late at night. I tried to stop Cutthroat from barging in, but he said it would be fine… I’m so sorry about all of this.”

Doctor sniffed, biting back another sharp remark about how she could’ve tried harder to not drop a pastry on her floor. 

Swindler, taking Doctor’s silence as accepting her apology, went on a bit more steadily. “My name is Swindler, by the way. I hope we’ll become friends, even if our first impression of each other was kind of awful.” She awkwardly laughed, holding out her hand for Doctor to shake. 

Doctor didn’t take her hand. “Hmph. You may just call me Doctor, that’s all anyone ever calls me, anyway.” I don’t intend on getting close enough to you for you to call me anything else . 

Swindler didn’t seem to pick up on Doctor’s sourness towards her, offering a smile. “I know it’s a bit late for dinner, but maybe I can order us something? It’s on me, to make up for the pie.”

“You can order something for yourselves, I’m perfectly fine with my wine.”

“Are you sure? It’s not a bother, please let me get you something!” 

You’re the bother, here! Doctor’s mind screamed.

“No. Thank you.” 

“Oh. Um, okay.”

As Doctor poured herself a very tall glass of wine, she could hear those two whispering quietly amongst themselves, likely about what they were going to order. 

As Swindler called in their food, Doctor noted the expression on Cutthroat’s face. It was downright soft : she’d never imagined him as capable of ever making that sort of face before. 

She took a sip of her wine. This girl... she narrowed her eyes. There’s something...off about her. She’s nice, yes, but...too nice. She could be dangerous, even. Her eyes flicked back to Cutthroat’s tender expression. If she is, her target is already secured and ready for the slaughterhouse .

Doctor could pretend all she wanted that she didn’t care for Cutthroat, but the truth was that he was the only person in her life, the only person that stuck around despite how prickly and bitchy Doctor knew she was. No matter how much she pushed him away, the fact of the matter was that a small part of Doctor did care about Cutthroat, and wanted him to stay. 

And that part of her was screaming right now that Cutthroat was in danger.

Doctor almost wanted to laugh at the idea that Cutthroat could be in danger-- he was more a danger to himself than anyone could be to him-- but physical danger wasn’t the only way someone could be hurt. As a doctor, she’d seen countless cases where emotional and mental danger was far more grave than anything physical. And after seeing how Cutthroat jumped to Swindler’s defense at the slightest thing…

Swindler could very well be living up to her title and manipulating Cutthroat into being the perfect drone, protecting her and doing her bidding, and Cutthroat was completely blind to it. 

Doctor had to put a stop to this, before Cutthroat faced the consequences of Swindler’s manipulations.

Chapter Text

After the fiasco of meeting Doctor, Swindler certainly didn’t expect a sudden text from her. Especially not an invitation to a nice new cafe that had just opened. But that’s what the text entailed. 

“See, I knew she would come around! You’re just too charming for her not to like you.” Cutthroat seemed very pleased about this new development, completely oblivious to any potential bad blood between the two women, but Swindler was a bit more hesitant. Doctor didn’t seem to like her much, if at all, even if she was playing nice that night they first met. Swindler was convinced that Doctor’s true feelings about her were much more negative, she just wasn’t showing her actual intentions yet. Doctor didn’t seem to be the sort of person that was upfront about what was on her mind, and used more subtle means to get what she wanted. Inviting Swindler out on a nice girl day seemed to be just the sort of thing Doctor would do if she had darker intentions.

For a moment, she considered that due to her profession, she could easily poison her drink.

She shook her head. No, no, she wouldn’t go that far. 

But even the thought made her nerves all the worse. 

Swindler entered the cafe at precisely 1:00, the time Doctor had specified. She’d done her best to look as neat and nice as possible; Doctor seemed to be the kind of person to care about appearances, something she wished she’d known before meeting her. If she had, she definitely would have tried harder to hold onto the pie.

Doctor was already there, looking pristine, sitting at a table and reading what looked to be one of those cheap erotic romance novels. For someone who placed so much importance on her appearance, she definitely had a lack of shame for how she herself was presented. As Swindler approached, she looked up.

“Oh, Twiddler, I see you’ve made it! And on time, as well.”

“Ah, it’s nice to see you, too. It’s, um, Swindler, by the way.”

“Of course, Wittler.”

Ah, she definitely doesn’t like me. 

“Where are my manners, please, take a seat.”

Cautiously, Swindler sat down. Doctor had barely lifted her eyes from the book, however, she didn’t seem to be reading it. Swindler shifted uncomfortably, unsure if she should try to make conversation or leave her to her novel. Doctor didn’t give her a chance to decide; primly shutting her novel, she leveled Swindler with an emotionless stare. “Now that you’ve arrived, I suppose we should order. What do you think you’ll get?”

“Maybe...what I always get? I think I might just get a latte-”

“Would you like something to eat? Some pie , perhaps?”

Swindler gulped.

Doctor flashed a smile with no warmth behind it. “Some strawberry pie it is, then!” Swindler tried to ignore the fact that it was the same type of pie she had brought to dinner.

A server flagged, Doctor made a point to order for both of them. When Swindler tried to protest, saying she had more than enough to pay for her own slice of pie and drink, Doctor smiled another chilly smile that made her words die in her throat. The server went away with their order, and Doctor settled her elbows on the table, entwining her fingers under her chin.

“I suppose you already know that I invited you here for a reason.”

“I- yes. I… I think I might know why.”

“Oh, really? Please, enlighten me.”

Swindler could feel her lifespan shortening, Doctor was so intimidating, but if Swindler wanted to assert herself and her autonomy, she needed to do this. “...I don’t think you like me very much.”

“Whatever gave you that idea?” Doctor’s eyes flashed with malice; she made no attempt to hide her vitriol from Swindler, her poised and polite words only serving to make Swindler even more unsettled. 

“I… I don’t know, you’ve been nothing but polite to me, but I just feel like you do.”

“Ah, fantastic. You may not be quite as stupid as I thought you were.”

Doctor leaned into Swindler’s space, making Swindler lean back in her seat. “However, I am no fool. Nobody is this nice. I suggest you drop the act.”

“Act?!” 

“That right there. The vapid, nice, basic girl act. Pretending you don’t know anything so you can get away with your plans.”

“I-I really don’t know what you’re talking about!”

“Yes, you do. And I know why you’re doing it. You put on this act so you can take advantage of hi-”

“Your order is served! ” A new voice butted into their conversation with flourish. Swindler could cry, thank God, oh thank God, I’m saved . 

A scruffy man with the most ostentatious, green pompadour swaggered up to their table, their coffees and pie sliding dangerously on the serving tray he was trying to balance with finesse.

“Hoodlum! What are you doing here?” “Why is this oaf serving us?”

Within a split second, Hoodlum went from smiling towards Swindler, to noticing Doctor sitting with her and his eyes widening with fear. He nearly dropped the tray in his fear, but Swindler was quick enough to stabilize it and save their food. 

“Swindler! Fancy seeing you here! It’s a small world, huh.” Hoodlum gratefully grinned at her, noticeably trying to hide behind her chair, away from Doctor’s glare.

“How..? I didn’t know that you two knew each other!’

Doctor gave a frustrated sigh, causing Hoodlum to squeak and duck even further behind Swindler’s chair. “Yes, unfortunately we know each other. This parasite and his host are close to Cutthroat.”

“Oh, that’s how I know them, too, but that’s not very nice to call them that...”

“ Great . With you here, you can complete the three stooges.”

“O-O-Or the three musketeers!” Hoodlum protested from behind where he was cowering behind Swindler.

“Whatever makes you feel better. I can’t get anything done with you here, this will have to be for another day. I’ll take mine to go.” Doctor waved a dismissive hand to Hoodlum, having him take away her espresso and pie. Hoodlum was quick to scurry away with them, happy to get far away from her wrath. “As for you , we’ll have to continue this another time. Goodbye for now, you’ll be seeing me again soon.” 

“W-wait a minute! Before, you were accusing me of taking advantage of someone. You think I’m trying to manipulate Cutthroat?!” Swindler couldn’t restrain her anger at this accusation. 

“We’re not talking about this now. I’m leaving, I recommend you do the same, before those two sap any remaining intelligence out of your head.” Turning away, Doctor caught Hoodlum as he came back with her packaged order on the tray, took them, and breezed out the door, leaving Swindler sitting at the table with Hoodlum hovering beside her.

A new voice spoke up from behind them. “Sooooo….would you like the check?” 

Swindler groaned. She should’ve known that if Hoodlum was working here, so was Brawler. 

“Ugh.. yes, please.” She took the check book from Brawler’s ridiculously large hands. And then she remembered. “Doctor paid already…” 

Speak of the devil, as soon as Swindler said that, Doctor was storming back into the cafe, drink in hand. “I’m not here for you,” she shot at Swindler, then turned to the sweating cashier, “Excuse me, who made this drink? It’s completely wrong. I ordered an espresso, this is an Americano. How the hell did you even manage to make an Americano in this tiny cup?!”

“Oh, I made that one!” Brawler stuck his hand up much too excitedly, bumping against the ceiling. 

“That’s the seventh drink you’ve made wrong today, and we’ve only been open for four hours! That’s it, you’re fired, and your little friend, too!” Someone, presumably the manager, shouted from behind the counter. 

“Ah, fuck.”

Swindler went home with a headache. 

Meanwhile, Doctor went home and realized that Swindler hadn’t called Brawler an idiot, a moron, or anything else behind his back. Since he was...friends, for lack of a better word, with Cutthroat, she’d had to treat his injuries more times than she could count. A supposedly kind nurse or receptionist would always, without fail, call him a fool or something, showing an ugly side to them that they rarely let slip.

Swindler hadn’t done that. 

Oh, well, she thought, so her mask is a bit harder to break than others. Whatever. At some point, she’ll have to show her true colors. With that, Doctor went about her usual routine, and tried to forget the genuine shine in Swindler’s eyes when she defended her...friends.

Chapter Text

Even before the call, Courier had a sinking feeling that his night was going to be hell. He had no reason to suspect this, it was merely a hunch.

Then he heard about a bar fight nearby that had ended in a dead body and three suspects, and he simply knew . 

Then he heard that he would be the one interrogating them, and he could feel a migraine coming on. 

The three suspects were separated in three different rooms, waiting for their turn to be interrogated. The first suspect, a trembling man near tears, with a green pompadour, circular glasses, and a purple suit.

Courier may not care about fashion, but even he wondered what the hell went through this man’s head when he’d chosen his outfit.

“Alright, let’s get this over with. Tell me your account of what happened.”

As if those were magic words, the man suddenly puffed up his chest (as if he were an exotic bird ruffling his feathers to appear bigger), and began his account:

“My bro and I went with my other bro and his girl to a bar, I think we got there around 9 at night? Anyway, we were totally just chilling, when a bar fight breaks out for some reason, and my bro joins in! I couldn’t just leave him hanging, y’know? So I hop in there and start toooootally busting ass, just cracking heads left and right! I’m kicking ass, not even breaking a sweat! And then suddenly, there’s screaming (like, more screaming than before, with all the girls totally being into me and how badass I am) and there’s just this dude on the floor, with like wayyyy a lot of blood coming out of him and a knife sticking out of him. And I’m like, oh shit, I didn’t do that-”

Courier lifted a hand up to pause him. He already knew 90% of that story was utter bullshit. “Cut the shit, I know that didn’t happen. Anything you say can and will be used against you, as you were told before, and you lying to me isn’t going to help in your court case.”

The flamboyant man deflated, as if all his hot air was leaving, and he started trembling again. 

“Okay, okay! I’m sorry!” he wailed, “I lied! I’m sorry! PLEEAASE don’t hurt me!”

Courier sighed, gesturing for him to continue.

“The first part of the story was true, I swear! We got there and were just chilling at the bar counter, and my buddy’s girl left to go to the bathroom or something. It feels like right after that, a bar fight started, I had no idea what happened! I was so scared, I ran behind the counter and just hid there until the cops came. I saw the body on the floor after I came out to see what was going on.” 

Now that was the truth. At least from this loser’s perspective. If Courier looked closely, he thought he could even see some dust on the suspect’s dark suit, from where he was laying on the floor behind the counter. Probably curled in the fetal position. Probably crying, judging from the man’s puffy eyes.

Deep down, Courier wondered why this guy was even a suspect. 

“Alright. It seems to match up with what we’ve heard from our witnesses, as well. That’s all we need from you for now, we’ll come back if we need to know anything else. But judging from your statement, I don’t think we’ll be coming back to you for details.”

The man slumped over, almost over-dramatically in relief. “Oh, thank God.”

Leaving the green-haired man to his whimpering, Courier stepped into the next room to interrogate the next suspect. 

The first thing he noticed was his height. Courier was a tall man; often the tallest in the room. This guy almost made him feel small. He looked cramped sitting hunched in the chair; the handcuffs on him were at the largest they could fit and they still seemed to be squeezing the man’s wrists.

After getting through the opening statements, Courier asked him to give his account of what happened.

The man’s eyes brightened excitedly. Courier’s headache throbbed even more, suspecting what was coming. “Me and my bro, and my other bro and his girlfriend or something, all went out to the bar today! I’m super pumped, because whenever I go to bars and stuff there always is a fight, and I get to brawl some dudes! We go at like 9, I think, but I don’t know how to read the funny little clock they have there so I don’t really know, I asked my bro! I’m just waiting for a fight to start, and after my bro’s girlfriend goes somewhere, my bro starts beating on this guy, and I’m like hell yeah! And start beating random guys too. I bet my other bro that came with me was totally kicking ass, he’s always so badass whenever a fight breaks out, he tells me about it all the time! But yeah, too bad the fight ends early because some guy died or whatever and the cops had to come.”

Courier already knew this guy wouldn’t be able to answer, but he asked, “Do you know why there was a fight in the first place?” 

“Don’t know, don’t care, I just wanna be there when it happens!” The man attempted to shrug despite the handcuffs. The cuffs creaked dangerously loud.

Of course . “Alright. I’ll be back if I need to know anything more.”

Now, the third suspect, although Courier already had a sinking suspicion of who it was. And upon opening the door, lo and behold, there was the bane of his existence. 

“Hi, Courier! Wow, it’s so great to see you again, I’ll have to tell Swindler I saw you!”

Please, don’t. She probably already knows.

Rubbing his eyes tiredly, Courier just gestured for Cutthroat to give his statement after he finished saying the opening statements. Cutthroat already knows the drill, he’s been here far too many times.

“My friends Hoodlum and Brawler, as well as my beautiful angel, who was wearing a gorgeous red dress that night and had done her eyeliner particularly well, highlighting her perfect cheekbones and her lovely pink eyes-” Courier forced him to get back on track. “-decided to go to a bar tonight. We agreed to all meet at the bar at 9 pm, and when we all arrived, we just sat at the counter. My angel leaves to use the restroom, and when I’m not paying attention, I see this scum slip something in her drink.” Cutthroat seethed, a shadow falling over his face. Courier could feel himself tense up as well, and consciously tried to smooth the notes he’d crumpled. 

“And I knew I couldn’t let him live.”

“So you killed the victim?”
“Yep!”

“And it was on purpose?”

“Well~ yes, and no.”

“What, did he fall on your knife or something? Please elaborate.”

“I made a valiant effort, but he was a tough little shit. But then he slipped on a puddle of some person’s spilled drink, and fell onto my knife. So yes, I did try to kill him, but did I actually kill him? Unfortunately, no.” Cutthroat pouted.

“You’ve gotta be fucking kidding me.”

“I’m not kidding you! That’s what really happened. Trust me, if I actually succeeded in killing the fucker, I would be taking credit for it.”

Next, suspects are gonna be telling me that victims slipped on banana peels . Wait, I shouldn’t be jinxing this.

“Okay… I’ll take it. I’ll come back if I need more additional details on the incident. And,” Courier couldn’t help himself from taking Cutthroat’s shoulder and leaning in to mutter, “thanks, for keeping my sister safe, I guess… but also stop murdering people I swear to fuck.”

“Okaaaay!”

Courier hated how he was almost okay with Cutthroat murdering that shithead. 

That night, after speaking with more witnesses and hearing that the victim did, indeed, fall onto Cutthroat’s knife, as unbelievable as it sounded, Courier’s migraine only got worse. Somehow it intensified when one of Brawler’s sisters, who was practically Courier’s height without heels, came to bail him and Hoodlum out.

“Oh, hey sis-” Brawler had started before she grabbed him abruptly by the ear. To Courier’s shock, the giant of a man started yelling ouch . 

“What have we told you?! What have we told you?!” 

“To not be sent to jail?” Hoodlum offered meekly.

The woman’s expression softened, although her grip on Brawler’s ear did not. “Sorry about my brother always dragging you into messes, Hoody,” she said. It seemed her hold on her brother’s ear tightened, as his shouts of pain only grew louder. Turning to Courier, she added, “And sorry you had to babysit my brother. He’s a good guy, just a doofus.”

With Brawler in tow and Hoodlum scampering behind, she left the police station, leaving Courier alone with Cutthroat, who was still in cuffs. 

“Can I have my knife back?” he asked.

“Hell no.”

When all three of them were sentenced to varying hours of community service a week later in court, Courier had to restrain himself from screaming.

***

Coming home from the court case (“Thanks for giving me a ride, Courier!” “Fuck off.”), Courier and Cutthroat were immediately assaulted by Swindler launching herself at them with excitement.

“CUTTHROAT! COURIER! YOU’LL NEVER BELIEVE THIS!”

Courier immediately thought, This could either be excellent news or very bad news… and judging from what I’ve had to go through already today...

Laughing, Cutthroat swung Swindler up in his arms. “What is it, angel?”

Swindler broke away from Cutthroat to look at him. “I… I finally get to see them again! My baby brother and sister! I can finally adopt them!” Her eyes started brimming with happy tears, she couldn’t stop herself from smiling. She threw herself back into Cutthroat’s hug, squealing with joy.

Courier was in a state of shock. Finally, after over two years, his sister’s lifelong dream of being reunited with her siblings was coming true.

Swindler broke away from Cutthroat and brought Courier into a tight hug. “Thank you, thank you for helping me with everything. I love you.”

Allowing himself to smile, Courier hugged her back. 

“Congratulations, Swindler.”

Chapter Text

Swindler’s first impression of the little brother she hadn’t seen since he was a baby was that he was like a cat. A very nervous, skittish cat. As she attempted to show him and their sister around her place, he barely uttered a word. At least Sister had said hello, albeit very shyly. And once he was in his new room, Swindler couldn’t pry him out. 

This was not the reunion she had expected. 

Sister tugged at her sleeve gently. “It’s okay, he’s always like that,” she said in her soft voice. 

Swindler sighed. “I understand...I just…” she couldn’t express this disappointment to either of them. She remembered them, but only as babies. They had no memories of her at all. It was only natural they were apprehensive. 

“...I’m just happy to be with you two again.” Swindler tried her best to smile reassuringly, but she could tell that the two children saw through her.

Brother didn’t even leave his room for dinner. Sister ate with Swindler and Cutthroat, but she brought back Brother’s meal to him. When she entered the room, Sister peeking in from behind her, Brother was bundled up in blankets behind the door, no part of him visible.

“Hey,” Swindler tried to make her voice as soft as possible. “Dinner is ready, are you feeling hungry now? You missed lunch.”

Brother’s blanket covered head shook no. 

Swindler was at a bit of a loss for what to say. In her life, there had never really been anyone that completely avoided interacting with her. Even Courier, when she was first adopted, spoke to her and played with her. As he became more adjusted to her, they only became closer. So in this sort of situation, with Brother completely isolating himself save for Sister, she wasn’t sure what to do. 

“I’ll leave the food here, in case you’re hungry later,” she said, setting the plate on the desk. Brother didn’t respond, but Sister’s smile was a silent thank you. 

Swindler was silent for a moment, thinking of what to say.

“I know that it’s hard right now, adjusting to life here. But I just want you to know that you can take as long as you need. You’re safe here, and you can take as long as you need to feel like you’re home.”

There was a long moment, then the blanket slowly nodded. With that, Swindler left Sister and Brother to their devices.

As she closed the door, she could hear them saying something quietly to each other. A deep ache spread from her heart all over. She hadn’t seen them in twelve years. Nigh strangers. It stung, despite her efforts to have accepted that was likely going to happen. 

But there wasn’t anything she could do about it. She couldn’t change the past, couldn’t change that she was separated from her baby siblings; all she could do now was make the best of it, and work hard to give her siblings the best life possible in spite of everything that has happened. 

A few weeks went by like that, with Brother hiding in his room for most of the day, and Sister making conversation on occasion, but spending most of her time with Brother. Sometimes, on nights that Swindler couldn’t sleep, she could faintly hear Brother padding around the house. It made her wonder what sorts of terrible foster homes made him only feel safe coming out at night, when everyone else was asleep. She was silently thankful she’d been adopted pretty quickly by Courier’s family. It wasn’t their fault they couldn’t afford three new kids rather than one. She couldn’t think too much about what sorts of things Brother and Sister may have experienced, or she would feel tears come to her eyes. 

“What do you think we can do to help him feel more comfortable?” Swindler asked Cutthroat one night, when they were both lying in bed at night.

“Hrm?” Cutthroat mumbled, already half asleep. 

“Do you think there’s anything we can do?”

“Hm…” Cutthroat rolled to face her and wrapped an arm over her, nuzzling his face into her shoulder. “I dunno. He’ll come around eventually, don’t worry about it.” And with that, he promptly fell asleep. Swindler continued to lie awake, thinking of things that could help.

Courier was kind of the same when he was younger. Maybe he knows what could help.

“Hey.”

Brother lifted his head from his blanket to see Sister sitting at the foot of his bed.

“Yeah?”

She scooched closer. “This isn’t like the other homes, Brother. This is our big sister. She won’t give us up.”

“She doesn’t feel like our big sister. We barely know her. And her boyfriend is weird .”

“Yeah, but they’re both nice to us. We don’t remember her, but that doesn’t mean that she doesn’t care about us. It just means that we need to get to know each other again.”

“We never knew her in the first place.”

“You know what I mean. You’re not being very nice to her, you know. She really wants to get to know you, you know. Sooner or later, you’re going to have to come out.”

“Then I’ll come out later.”

Sister sighed. “Well, I miss being able to hang out with you more. I get it, you miss them, I do too, but…”

Under the blanket, Brother clutched the little pouch their friends had made him.

“...maybe we’ll be able to see them again. You don’t have to hide just because you’re afraid of being hurt, or afraid of making new friends. They wouldn’t want you to be unhappy like this.”

Brother covered his head up with the blanket again, and that was the end of the conversation. Sister exited the room, heart still heavy.

“Hmmm.”

“ Hmmm ? That’s all you have to say?” Swindler had gotten up earlier than usual to call Courier before he got to work.

“I haven’t had coffee yet, okay, I’m still half-asleep.”

Swindler harrumphed. “Okay, okay. But please call or text me back later when you have the chance.”

“Hm. Well...”

“What?? You thought of something?”

“Not really an idea, but...I just find it funny how my parents adopted you because I was so standoffish as a kid.”

As a kid? 

A lightbulb suddenly went off in Swindler’s brain. “Wait...I think...oooh...I have an idea! Gotta go, thank you so much, love you!”

“Hey, wait, what’s this idea-”

Swindler hung up.

For the rest of the day Courier wasn’t certain whether he should be worried or not. 

“Where are we going?” Sister asked. Brother stayed silent, only gazing out the window. Sister was relieved she’d finally been able to coax him from his room. It had been a few weeks; maybe he’d been growing bored, needed to go outside to do something, anything. 

Swindler was shifting excitedly in the driver’s seat. “You’ll see!” she said. “I think Brother will really like this!” They pulled into the parking lot of a nondescript building, and Brother could feel his heart start pounding. Where are we? His mind reeled with too many ideas, too many possibilities-

“We’re here! It’s the animal shelter!”

“See,” Sister took Brother’s hand to calm him. “It’s okay.”

Brother slowly let out a breath. This wasn’t bad. But still, why the animal shelter?

“You know, when I was first adopted, my brother was a really tough guy to get to know! But when I came, he started coming out of shell. I thought,” Swindler paused. “That maybe we could do the same thing to help you feel more comfortable.” 

Against his will, Brother’s heart leapt a little at that. He remembered a previous home with a ginger cat who had loved to snuggle against his head. He and Sister had loved that cat, liked it more than their foster parents that time. Not that it was hard.

“Come on!” Swindler got out of the car, opening the back doors for Brother and Sister. Sister took Swindler’s offered hand, holding it after she got out of the car, but Brother didn’t. He still stuck close to Swindler though, a huge leap of progress compared to a few weeks ago.

They entered the building, Swindler leading the trio. “Go on,” she encouraged, “we’re here for you! You can decide where we go.” Brother nodded stiffly, still not quite in his element, but he made a beeline for the cat section, and the two girls followed.

The cute sound of meowing was everywhere. Lots and lots of kittens especially. But Brother didn’t want a kitten. He’d never dealt with one before, they seemed a lot of trouble, and needed a lot of love he wasn’t sure he could give. He wanted a calmer, older cat. 

Most of the older cats were fast asleep. But as he passed by a snoozing black cat, he saw its ear twitch, and suddenly, a pair of green eyes were staring directly into his red ones. 

It meowed softly, a gentle hello. 

Brother’s heart seized, and he knew that it was the right cat for him.

“Did you find one you like?” Swindler asked softly, Brother still staring at the cat and gently holding one of the bars of the cage. Brother nodded, and Swindler went to go speak with one of the staff.

They left the animal shelter with Brother holding a cat carrier. As they climbed into the car, Brother gently holding the carrier in his lap, Swindler asked, “What do you think you’ll name him?”

Brother thought back to the cats in the foster homes before. There had been plenty of them. He leaned over to take another look at their-- no, his -- new cat, and the cat stared right back. It looked sophisticated and composed, like if it could speak it would do so with propriety. 

It meowed another one of those soft meows. 

“Maybe,” Brother started, “maybe I’ll name him Professor.” It was the first time Swindler had heard him speak properly.

“He certainly does look like one.” Swindler agreed, heart full of joy.

“But he’s a cat, he should be Purr-fessor! ” Sister laughed. 

Brother gave a tiny smile. “Purrfessor it is.”

As if on cue, the cat meowed, this time louder. 

That night, Swindler knocked gently on Brother’s door again, and as usual, there was no response.

“Brother?” Swindler cautiously opened the door, not wanting to invade his privacy. This time, he wasn’t hiding behind the door in the corner; instead, Swindler found him curled up on the bed for the first time, blanket wrapped tightly around him, and with a black ball of fur beside him. Both were sleeping soundly. Swindler even thought she saw him smiling. She had to stop herself from squealing, it was an adorable sight, and she felt today that Brother was finally starting to feel comfortable around them, for the first time.

Later, Courier would receive a picture of Brother and Purrfessor sleeping, and an attached text saying, “You’re a genius.”

“I know.” He responded.

Chapter Text

They met at the same place they always met up, at the counter of a less-popular bar in town. 

“Good to see you again, you’re always a sight for sore eyes.” Doctor smirked at Courier, who had just arrived and sat on a stool beside her. He grunted in response. Even after meeting up every now and then, he found her flirty way of speaking very uncomfortable. It was hard to find a good drinking buddy, though, so he put up with it, even if it was annoying.

“I’m not gonna have much tonight,” he said.

“Oh, why’s that?”

Courier almost smiled one of his rare smiles. “My little sister finally managed to adopt her younger siblings. I’m meeting them tomorrow.”

Doctor sighed and stretched her arms. “What a coincidence. My...friend,” she said, as if uncertain about what term to use, “His girlfriend also recently adopted.” She rolled her eyes. “He won’t stop gushing about how much happier she is than usual.”

“Sounds like he’s a good boyfriend.”

“That’s arguable. Frankly, if I liked his girlfriend a bit more, I’d feel sorry for her for having to deal with him. She doesn’t seem to mind though, which is suspicious.”

Courier raised an eyebrow. “How so?”

“My friend is someone of...talent, and he’s also an idiot. It wouldn’t be hard for her to manipulate him for her own purposes. And the way she always acts so saccharine sweet-” Doctor’s hand tightened around her wine glass. “-I don’t trust her.”

“God,” Courier accepted his drink from the bartender, “I wish my little sister’s boyfriend was decent. I don’t know what she sees in him, he’s just a criminal.”

“Sounds like you need to start stepping in, if she’s mixing with the wrong sort of people.”

He sighed. “I want to, honestly, but I know that my sister would be upset with me. I can’t deal with her being mad at me.”

“Aww, looks like the stone-cold man has a soft, squishy heart after all.” Doctor laughed as Courier growled at her. “I like that in a man.”

“Jesus, will you quit it with that?”

Doctor didn’t answer, she only smirked as she took a sip of her drink.

“ Anyway. The things she does for that man... he doesn’t deserve her. And honestly I don’t know if I trust that guy around the kids.”

“What does the guy even look like? Maybe I can keep an out for him. Perhaps he’ll come to the hospital one day and have… an unfortunate accident.”

“Please don’t, that’s part of the problem I have with him.”

“Hm?”

“Well…” Courier shifted in his seat. “If you killed him-”

“Who said anything about murder?”

“That’s the problem! That’s where my brain is leaping to far too often these days, because of her fucking boyfriend!”

“Seems like we know a lot of similar people. Anyway, are you going to order something else,” she indicated to his empty glass, “or did you just come here because you like my company that much?” She topped this off with a wink.

Courier quickly ordered something before she made more uncomfortable comments. 

Doctor could clearly see that he was perturbed by her comment, and thoughts of his little sister’s safety, so she offered, “Do you have a photo? I’m not going to do anything drastic , but I can still keep an eye out for you. It pays to be able to see who’s coming in and out of a place like the hospital, both literally and figuratively.”

“Yeah.” Courier dug around in his jacket pocket, and pulled out his ancient flip phone (and ignored Doctor’s scoff at his old man technology). “She’s always sending me pictures whenever they do something together.”

He handed the flip phone off to Doctor, and she froze.

“If they end up getting married, there is no God. I am renouncing him.”

“You’re joking, right.”

“Hm?”

“You’re pulling my leg.”

“No, I really will renounce him if they get married.”

“That is not what I am talking about.” 

“Then what are you talking about? Spit it out.”

“You mean to tell me your darling, precious, sweet little sister is this bitch?”

Courier visibly bristled. “ Hey. You’re on thin fucking ice.” 

“And the boyfriend that you claim to be an absolute menace is my brother .”

“Excuse me?” 

Wait a moment. Shit, I’ve been spending too much time with him . “Well, no, we’re not related, not even adopted, it’s just what he calls me all the damn time-”

“Ex-fucking-scuse me?”

“My… ugh. My friend that I was telling you about.”

“Oh my God.”

“I don’t technically think you’re allowed to say that anymore.”

“Mind your own damn business. Stay on track here: we’re both related to the other’s mortal enemies.” 

Doctor huffed and leaned onto the counter. “I guess we’re fated to be apart, like Romeo and Juliet.”

“Yes to the first part, no to everything else.”

Doctor batted her eyelashes at Courier and he groaned again.

“Listen. I don’t know what on God’s green earth-” 

“Blasphemer.” 

“-Shut it- made you think that my sister is a bad person, but I suggest you figure it out. She’s never done anything deserving of your terrible opinion of her, and from it sounds like most of the bias you have against her is from your own preconceived notions, before you’ve even gotten to know her. In addition, I think you need to reevaluate how you think of your friend as well. I hate to be saying this, but he deserves to have his choices respected. He’s an adult, and if you’re not even willing to acknowledge him as family, what makes you think you have a right to dictate who he dates? He could be doing much worse for himself. Respect him the same way I respect my sister’s decisions, even if I hate who she’s chosen.”

Courier stood up from his stool and knocked back his drink.

“Relationships are based on respect and trust. If you can’t manage that, then no wonder you’re mostly alone.”

Courier left, and as Doctor heard his motorcycle rumble away, she considered what he said. She hated to admit it, but he was right. 

“Stupidly hot man even gives good advice. Damn.”

The first thing Courier noted upon meeting Brother and Sister was: Damn, they look like Swindler, and then: Wait, why does the boy look like a supervillain with that cat on his lap? 

After Swindler introduced the three of them, the girl smiled and said hello, but the boy didn’t say anything. Just...kinda glared at him while stroking the cat. Courier didn’t even get the feeling that the boy was trying to be intimidating. Besides, he looked too much like Swindler to be so anyway. Reminded him of the few times they had fights as kids and she tried to give him the silent treatment before she inevitably broke down crying back to him. 

A minute of pure silence between them passed.

Okay, this is fucking awkward. He coughed. “Well...would you guys like to ride my bike?” he finally asked. He was starting to regret his bike being his only topic of conversation.

To his surprise, the boy’s hand shot up first. The cat leapt off his lap in a huff, as if upset he had stopped petting him.

“Is it scary?” was all the girl asked.

“Not with me driving.”

He thought he saw Swindler hide her mouth briefly to laugh out of the corner of his eye. 

“Oooh, can I ride too?” he asked.

“No way in hell,” Courier snapped, not even bothering to look at Cutthroat.

“Awww…”

“There’s only enough room for three people,” he heard Swindler reassure him. 

It was only after he’d driven the kids around for five minutes, he had no idea where he was going. 

It had been years since he’d dealt with twelve year olds. What the hell do they even like to do? What did I even do?

“Um…” he heard the girl softly say. “I’m...kinda hungry.”

Ah . If that was the case, he knew exactly where to take them.

Except for the fact that he had completely missed the turn and would have to drive for a half a mile before he could turn around. 

“Shit,” he muttered.

“You shouldn’t say that!” the girl said. “It’s rude!”

Yeah, she’s definitely like Swindler as a kid. 

“I’m not known for being the most polite person, kid.”

Sister puffed out her cheeks in annoyance at being called a kid, and Courier had to restrain a smile. Yep, definitely like Swindler .

“Hey, don’t just try to eat it right away, you’ll burn-”

“ Ow !” Both kids cried in almost perfect unison. 

“Now, what was I telling you? You gotta let these little shits cool first, otherwise you’ll burn your entire mouth.” 

“Thath’s ruthe!” Sister tried to say with a burnt tongue.

“Tch. Shut up and eat.”

Courier blew on one of the takoyaki a little, and popped it into Sister’s open mouth.

She chewed for a moment. “...Mmm! What is this, it’s so good!”

“It’s rude to talk with your mouth full.” Courier smirked as Sister tried to stick out her tongue at him with a full mouth. “It’s takoyaki. When Swindler and I were little we used to get it all the time together. But now that we’re older, we’re too busy to just go out and do fun shit like this.”

Courier found himself saying more than he’d ever willingly said in front of strangers before. Maybe it was the children’s resemblance to his sister that made his tongue looser. 

The siblings looked at each other. “I hope that doesn’t happen to us!” the girl said.

The brother didn’t say anything, he just nodded as he stuck another entire takoyaki in his mouth. 

After that, there was a stretch of silence. Courier found himself speaking up again.

“Why do you two trust me so much? We’ve only just met.”

They both looked down for a moment, and to everyone’s surprise, Brother spoke first.

“Because Swindler trusts you.”

“Yeah! And Swindler is nice, so if she likes you, you must be nice, too! Even if you say ‘shit’ too much.” Sister grinned at Courier, but then realized what she had said, and clapped her hands to her mouth, cheeks flushing with embarrassment. 

Courier couldn’t help but chuckle at that. “Now we’re both rude.”

For a moment, Sister looked as though she was about to protest before Brother started laughing. She whirled on him.

“What’re you laughing about?!”

Brother only shook his head and wiped some tears from his eyes. 

“Did you guys have fun?” Swindler welcomed them home, wiping her hands of flour on her apron, while Cutthroat was busy in the kitchen putting way too much red food coloring into icing.

“Yeah! We got takoyaki!”

“You did? Now I’m jealous, he never takes me out for takoyaki anymore.” Swindler made a show of pouting up at her brother, and Courier patted her head.

“I’ll change that soon.”

“Anyway, we made cookies while you three were gone, and they’re about done now! We can decorate them together.”

“Not if Mr. Cutthroat doesn’t stop making every dish of icing red.” Brother pointed behind Swindler, catching Cutthroat just as he accidentally stuck his hand in the bowl of icing in his food coloring vigor.

“What? Cutthroat!”

“I guess you could say you caught me red-handed!”

Against his will, Courier smiled one of his rare half smiles.

Chapter Text

Despite appearances, Cutthroat was not a carefree person. Far from it, in fact.

He didn’t care what happened to him, he’d never felt his life was particularly important or valuable. 

He did have some self-awareness; he knew he wasn’t “normal”, and not only because for some reason, he could only see the world in black, white, and shades of red and even pink. 

“Normal” people didn’t carry knives around with them at all times, and feel the urge to slice things up and make them bleed because it looked pretty. 

“Normal” people didn’t have families that abandoned them.

So when some overly-confident asshole tried to mug him in a dark, empty alley, Cutthroat didn’t  hold back. If the only joy he could get is from slicing people to his heart’s content, then why should he deprive himself? His life didn’t have much meaning outside of that, anyway, and he didn’t care where it landed him since he didn’t have anything to live for. Perhaps a death sentence would be more interesting than meaningless killing.

But then he saw an angel.

He was in the courtroom as the defendant, being tried as the perpetrator of a vicious murder due to an attempted mugging, and in the jury box was the most beautiful woman he’d seen in his life, standing out against the black and white crowd in a beautiful pink. If he squinted hard enough, he could even imagine a large red halo glowing behind her head as if she were a saint in a holy classical painting.

However, she wasn’t looking at him. Instead, she was biting her thumb anxiously and staring at the prosecutor, who was pacing back and forth in front of the jury’s box, going on about Cutthroat’s extensive history of criminality and mental instability. Cutthroat idly wondered why the prosecutor was even trying, he was practically already guilty. They could have hired a child and the verdict would be the same. On the other hand, Cutthroat’s defense attorney was looking quite nervous, but raised his hand to speak.

“Permission to speak, Your Honor?”

“You may.”

“We still have one more witness to hear from.”

“As if that will change this case at all,” the prosecutor grumbled, irritated at being interrupted, ”this is an open-and-shut case.”

“You may proceed with your witness.”

As a nervous looking nurse took the stand, Cutthroat didn’t even bother paying attention anymore. The prosecutor was right, there was no way of mistaking the facts of this case. Besides, he had something much more interesting to pay attention to now.

Cutthroat gazed at the angel’s face as the nurse gave a shaky testimony, her eyebrows delicately furrowing the more the nurse spoke. He almost wanted to shut the nurse up just to clear the worry clouding the woman’s countenance, but at the same time, even her unsettled expression was breathtaking.

He just about jumped out of his chair when the jurors, including his angel, started getting up and leaving the courtroom. His attorney leaned in close to him, saying something.

“Are you even listening? I’m telling you, you have to plead Not Guilty by reason of insanity, the witness just gave us a huge opportunity with her testimony. You have the medical history to back it up-”

“No. I don’t care, I refuse to plead. I don’t care what happens to me. Just- where are they going?” Cutthroat couldn’t tear his eyes away from the leaving jurors.

“God, you really weren’t paying attention. They’re going into another room to discuss the case and deliberate over what they think the verdict should be.”

Cutthroat had only known his angel for the past few hours, but already the thought of being away from her was almost unbearable.

“How long will it take for them to decide?”

“Eh, it depends. It might take a little while, if their minds were changed by the last witness testimony.”

And it was a while. Cutthroat thought he’d been bored during the actual court proceedings, but now he was bored out of his mind. He had taken to staring at the high ceiling of the courtroom, tracing his eyes over the ornate decorations that curved over the edges of the ceiling tiles. This was his seventh run over them. Before that, he had been counting the number of fleur de lis there were in the room. On the ceiling itself, there were 38. Now, maybe he could try to count the cracks in the walls. 

He was just about to turn his head to do just that when the blessed sound of the courtroom double doors opening graced the court. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the prosecutor smirk at the defense, but he didn’t care about that. Leading the group of jurors was her , just as glorious as she had been when Cutthroat last saw her, close to three hours ago. 

There was uproar in the audience as the jury’s verdict was announced. The prosecutor tripped and smacked his head against his wooden desk. The judge yelled for order, hammering his gavel furiously.

Cutthroat didn’t care at all, because he was back to staring at his beloved juror, who was staring straight at the judge with a look of such determination, Cutthroat was sure his heart was going to stop. He loved that expression on her. How was she so captivating?

“Did you hear that?! We won! We won! I never thought this would happen, how in the world!” His defense attorney was shaking his shoulder, hopping excitedly. If he had any, he would probably be throwing confetti.

“Wuh? What happened?”

“You’re Not Guilty!”

Cutthroat blinked. “Wait, what? How?” 

“I don’t care, I’m just glad we rubbed it into that prosecutor’s face!”

Cutthroat turned away from his celebrating attorney, looking back to the jury, only to find the woman staring straight at him, and smiling gently.

His heart actually stopped this time. He could feel himself go lightheaded from the light and happiness she emitted. 

It was something he had never felt, never experienced in his entire life.

He needed her to stay. 

This was the first time in his life that he actually felt a will to do something with his life aside from destroying and painting things red. Scrolling endlessly through social media sites and websites selling personal information gave him a purpose. 

Theoretically, he could have asked Doctor to help him search by looking through medical records, but he didn’t. He knew that while he might consider Doctor a sister, her opinion of him was significantly poorer. She made it no secret she found him a near constant thorn in her side. Even when she gave him a rare compliment, it felt like there was poison laced somewhere in it. He was always the one to visit her, to instigate conversations. She never did. 

Despite what she thought of him, Cutthroat wasn’t enough of a fool to believe that she cared for him the way he did her. He clung to her because she was the only other person in the world that was like him: deranged yet methodical, living for her urges to dissect and take apart, and not caring for much else along the way. So while they understood each other on that level, Doctor’s lack of respect and care for him kept them apart. Cutthroat was used to that sort of relationship though, after all, his family threw him away as soon as they were legally able to. Even if Doctor’s treatment of him was callous, it was far warmer than what his family had given him. At least she didn’t forcibly push him away when he wanted to talk, even when she was busy. And she didn’t call his art edgy garbage; she only called it edgy. 

Shortly after the court case, Cutthroat created a new painting, titled “The Angel”. The very woman he saw that day was meticulously depicted as the focus of the painting, the halo he could almost see surrounding her in glorious red, almost like blood or even fire. It complemented his attempts to add pink (while he could see pink, it was never as vibrant or clear as red) in her hair and in the wings and halo, which were almost indistinguishable.  

“Since when did angels wear fingerless gloves and thigh highs?” Doctor scoffed a little when he showed her his finished piece. “Actually, nevermind. I can never tell what’s going on in your head.” 

“She’s a woman I saw at the trial. She was mesmerizing, I knew I had to do something to preserve my memory.”

“Wow, finally find someone that gets you hard and it’s at a trial where you’re being tried for murder. That’s so like you. Knowing you, you just want to slice her open, I don’t think you’re even capable of loving someone.” Doctor laughed at her own comment, and Cutthroat could feel his stomach curl with discomfort at the way Doctor spoke about him and the object of his affections. She wouldn’t even try to understand. 

But even he couldn’t help but wonder. Was there a darker intent beneath his affections? He didn’t think so, he’d felt bloodlust and murderous impulses his entire life, and this felt very different. But what if it was simply a different variant? 

Red would look beautiful on her. But did he want to see her bloodied? Did he want to be the reason for her covered in it? 

His stomach tightened at the thought. 

He had to find out, and so, he sought her out. He needed to learn exactly what it was that woman made him feel, and why it was the first time in his life he’d felt it. He kept silent about his quest to Doctor, since she made it clear what she thought of his feelings.

As he slowly learned about the mysterious woman, digging up abandoned social media profiles and photos, and eventually addresses, workplaces, and phone numbers, the feeling continued to grow. He started passing her workplace around the time she would leave, hoping to catch a glimpse of her. He started digging in her garbage, trying to piece together anything he could of her domestic life. Every time he managed to see her from afar, the feeling grew stronger. Paying for unexpected snacks and desserts at her favorite cafe and seeing her smile make her glow more made him even happier. 

He knew this couldn’t be a variant of bloodlust. Why would making his target happy be a goal of his? He supposed it didn’t matter, because it was the first thing in his life that made him truly happy, and he didn’t want it to end.

The first time Swindler saw and acknowledged him outside of the courtroom, Cutthroat could feel his soul ascending.

“H-Hey, what are you doing in the garbage can?!”

He could die happy now. He had reached enlightenment. 

Nobody had ever treated him so kindly, with nothing to gain from it, before. What had he done to deserve her grace?

At that moment, he decided: if love was real, and he could experience it, this was it. He would do anything to have her be his, because she was perfect. She was the thing that kept him alive, she was his reason for living.

She was his angel.

Chapter Text

Several days after her talk with Courier (he hadn’t been back to the bar since), Doctor found herself looking at her phone. She still had her reservations about Swindler, but to a certain degree, she did trust Courier, and knew even if he was biased, he was still reasonably objective. Which meant, although she hated to admit it, Swindler probably wasn’t as awful as she assumed. Thus, she would have to apologize for some of her crueler remarks.

But how was she going to do that? 

A text? No, that wasn’t proper enough, besides, she could misinterpret it as passive aggressive. 

Phone call? God no, the awkwardness would kill both of them. 

A letter? Jesus, what time period is this?

That settled it. The only way she could go about this was with a singing telegram. She would hire the finest man in a chicken suit to serenade her.

Who was she kidding, the only way she could possibly adequately apologize to her would be to meet them in person, even if that was the last thing she wanted to do. Her pride was at stake, but Doctor knew that she had honestly been rotten to Swindler, and apologizing to her face would be the only way to properly show her sincerity. 

She would just have to make sure that Brawler and Hoodlum wouldn’t be working wherever she invited her. She didn’t know what she would do if she looked like a fool in front of them . Probably throw herself into the lobster tank and try to end it all.

She decided to simply text her and ask if she could come by, since she knew she wouldn’t be able to stay for long afterwards without wanting to jump out of her skin and run. 

God fucking dammit, Swindler said yes. Doctor was actually going to do this. Curse Courier and his stupid ability to magically activate her previously-nonexistent guilt.

God why was it so hard just to walk up to the door? She couldn’t possibly be nervous , after all. She had a reputation to uphold, a reputation of being a nice (ugh) person that corrected her mistakes and was definitely not nervous .

Doctor was saved from her inner turmoil by Swindler opening the front door.

Out of the frying pan into the fire, I suppose .

“Come in, did you want to talk to me about something? Does it have to do with...what we were going to talk about last time?”

“...Yes, it does. Is there anyone else at home at the moment?”

“Yes, my little brother and sister are also home. They’re not in the living room though.”

“Perfect. Where’s Cutthroat, by the way?”

“He’s out grocery shopping right now. I can only hope he doesn’t get three bags of marshmallows again…”

Doctor stepped into their home, and was led by Swindler to their comfortable living room. She offered something to eat or drink, but Doctor declined.

“So… you two live together, I see.” Doctor was trying to buy time. Hopefully Swindler was as chatty about her love life as Cutthroat.

“Yes, after we started dating, we decided to move in together so that I wouldn’t have to renew my lease for my previous apartment. It was the best decision for the both of us. But speaking of Cutthroat,” Swindler took a seat across from Doctor, “what did you need to talk to me about?”

Damn it, she isn’t as chatty as Cutthroat. 

Doctor sighed and straightened in her seat. This was going to be awkward as all hell, so she needed to at the very least look as composed as possible. 

“I came here...to apologize.” There. She said it.

Swindler blinked. “This is, um. Unexpected.”

“I know we didn’t have the, ah, best of first impressions, but even after the initial meeting, I let my personal biases and suspicions define my opinion of you. Because of that, I treated you poorly. That wasn’t fair of me, so… I’m sorry.”

Swindler was quiet for a moment. And then she asked, “Sorry, but...what exactly prompted this? It’s so...sudden.”

Doctor barked out a laugh. “As it turns out, we have a mutual acquaintance.”

“Huh?”

“He’s your brother, Courier. We’re drinking buddies, actually, I didn’t even realize that you two were related until very recently, when he told me to sort it out with you.”

“Oh...huh. It’s a small world sometimes, isn’t it?” Swindler chanced a small smile, which Doctor took as accepting her apology.

Swindler spoke again, “I’m a bit surprised that he was able to convince you to come and talk to me, he’s not the best with words.”

“Hm, he can be convincing when he wants to be. Especially when he looks at you with that passion in his eyes, pretty sexy.”

Swindler flushed and laughed, embarrassed but also entertained by the idea of Courier being anything like that.

They were interrupted by the sound of quiet giggling and an immediate shush noise. 

Swindler sighed, “Alright, the gig is up, come on out you two.”

From around the corner, the twins shuffled out, having the decency to look a bit ashamed for listening in on the adults talking. “Sorry…”

“You know it’s not very polite to eavesdrop,” Swindler lightly scolded, but Doctor jumped in, to her own surprise.

“It’s alright, it’s not that big of a deal. More importantly,” she leaned towards the children, who stared at her with wide eyes, “aren’t you two adorable? You would look absolutely darling in a dress!” She cooed and pinched Sister’s cheek. Sister didn’t know what to do with herself, who was this random lady pinching her cheek?

Swindler couldn’t help but smile a little. This was certainly a different side to Doctor she hadn’t seen before. She never would have thought that she liked playing dress up with kids.

“I’m hooooooome~! I got three bags of marshmallows!” Cutthroat made his way to the living room, eager to greet Swindler. “Eh? Doctor, I didn’t know you came to visit! Why didn’t you tell me?” He puffed out his cheeks.

“I came to see Swindler today, not you. Is it wrong to have a little girl talk? And besides, I can see you whenever I want, you’re...” Doctor gathered her nerves, “...my brother.”

Cutthroat dropped the bags in shock, though there was no impact, as they were mostly filled with marshmallows.

“D...DOCTOR!” Cutthroat sprung towards Doctor, going for a hug.

“No, get back! Back, I say!” she shouted, brandishing...something, in a spray bottle and pointing it at him. Swindler wasn’t sure if she wanted to know what was in the bottle. 

“Awww, can’t I give my beloved sister a hug? Pleeeaaasee?”

“NO! My dignity has already been through enough today!”

“C’mere!”

“ Nooooo! ” Doctor followed through with her threat, spraying what Swindler could now smell as... fancy perfume, directly into Cutthroat’s open mouth.

“Bleh! Ewwww!” He immediately reached for one of the grocery bags, ripped open a bag of marshmallows, and popped several in his mouth. “Hnngg, eben d’ ma’mewwo’s tahte bahd n’w! (Hnngg, even the marshmallows taste bad now!)”

Swindler couldn’t help but laugh at the comical situation. They really were just like siblings. She could even see a little of her and Courier in them. 

“So, how have you been?” Doctor had ended up staying for dinner, and with Swindler busying herself in the kitchen and insisting that Doctor and Cutthroat spend a little time together, she had to try and make conversation, even if she wasn’t very good at it.

“Hmm… I was better before you POISONED me!” Cutthroat was still washing out the taste of perfume with a glass of cherry kool aid that Brother had so graciously made him.

“I warned you not to try to hug me, it’s your own fault.”

“Hmph!” Cutthroat stuck a cherry red tongue out at her. “But to be honest, I’ve been great! Swindler and I have the perfect life together, it’s all I’ve ever wanted. She’s all I’ve ever wanted. She’s absolutely perfect in every way.”

“Nobody’s perfect. And I’m not saying this because I dislike her, this time. She’s human.”

“No, you’re wrong. Swindler is faultless. The fact I’m even allowed to be with her is a miracle.” Cutthroat’s gaze darkened a bit, looking down at his hands. “It’s only because she’s so kind and perfect. I don’t deserve her, and yet she stays with me anyway.”

Doctor frowned. It wasn’t unusual for Cutthroat to just go on and on about Swindler, but something felt a little off this time. “Cutthroat, that’s not true. You two are in a partnership, you are equals in your relationship. I’m not sure that this mindset is healthy.”

“But we’re not, though. How can we be equals when she’s so good, and I’m...not? I’m nothing like her, I can’t be as kind or loving as her. She’s perfect, and everything to me, and she allows me to stay even though I can’t offer anything except my love and devotion. But…” he sighed. “She’s been feeling more...distant, lately.”

A crash was heard from the kitchen, and they both looked up quickly. 

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” Sister cried.

They heard Swindler gently consoling her, telling her it was only a glass, and to please not move, she didn’t want her to step on the glass. 

“They make her so happy. It’s wonderful to see.”

Doctor could sense a but in that sentence. 

“She devotes so much time to them… sometimes it’s a little hard not to get jealous.” Cutthroat tried to laugh it off, but there was still tension about him that made Doctor nervous.

Chapter Text

“Swindler, save me, please. Get me out of here. I’m begging. I’ll do anything you want.”

“Sorry, but no.”

“ Please .”

Swindler scoffed. “Stop being dramatic, Hacker, do your job! You can’t just slack and let everyone do all the work! Sometimes I think they have half a mind to fire you.”

“They wouldn’t fire me,” Hacker grumbled, his forehead still resting against the cash register. “I’m too smart for that.”

“Evidently being smart does not make you hard working. Now are you going to check me out or not?”

Hacker sighed like the world was ending, and started sluggishly checking Swindler’s items out. 

“You wanna know what fucking happened last night when I was on closing shift? Some guy and his wife or something are checking out and they only buy one HDMI cable , which you can buy at like, Walmart? Why are you at Best Buy? And when I go through the whole Best Buy Rewards Card™ spiel the guy’s like, ‘No, I wish!’ and I’m like what the fuck is wrong with you. And evidently his wife is thinking the same thing, because she’s like, ‘Jesus Christ ’ and just goes and stares at our TV displays for a while, and then -”

Swindler clearly wasn’t paying attention.

“Oi, are you listening?”

Swindler jolted and whipped her head up from where she was staring at her slightly chipped pink nail polish. “Huh? I’m sorry, I zoned out for a second...what did you say?”

“Well, I was telling you a story about a weird guy whose wife clearly didn’t want him to have a Best Buy Rewards Card™, but you weren’t listening. Also, you’re done checking out, that’s $24.36.”

Swindler paid and went to grab her bag, but Hacker stopped her.

“Are you feeling okay? You usually listen to my stupid stories, and you don’t tend to zone out unless you’re thinking about something really hard.”

Swindler looked down at her shoes, unsure of what she should say, but Hacker didn’t give her the chance to deliberate.

“Hey, Ryan! I'm taking my break now!" 

"You took your break ten minutes ago-" 

"I AM TAKING MY BREAK NOW."

Swindler tried to argue, “Hacker, I was just telling you that you should take your job seriously!”

“I’m telling you, they won’t fire me.” Hacker waved off her concern. “I’m the best guy in their dumb Geek Squad™ thingy, they couldn’t fire me even if they wanted to. But we’re not talking about me.”

He led her to the backroom for employees, and they both sat down. “What’s going on?”

Swindler picked at her nail polish anxiously. “It’s just… Lately, Cutthroat has been bringing up having the kids stay with Courier for a while, he’s been bringing it up a lot . But I just get so nervous thinking about it. I just got them back, after being separated for so long, and it feels like the kids are finally starting to get settled in and comfortable. I’m afraid of them leaving my sight again, and I don’t want to undo the progress that we’ve made with them.”

“Hmm… so basically what you’re saying is that your boyfriend wants to get the kids out of the house for a while and have them stay with your brother, but you feel uncomfortable with that?”

“Yeah, basically…”

“I can see where you’re coming from, especially since you worked so hard to get your siblings here in the first place, and have been working really hard to get them adjusted to it, but...don’t you deserve a break?”

“Huh?”

“You’ve been putting a lot of time and energy into taking care of the kids. I assume that your boyfriend is wanting to get them out of the house so that you guys can spend some quality time together, and so you can rest, because I bet ever since the kids came you two have been spending less time together, and you’ve been working yourself ragged. Maybe having them stay with Courier could be a good thing? Plus, from what you’ve told me, the kids like Courier a lot. What’s the risk?”

“You’re right… I never considered why Cutthroat might be suggesting it, I was too busy worrying about the kids. It’s been like that for a while now, actually… I think that Cutthroat just wants to have me to himself for a bit.”

“Yeah, he’s probably just feeling a little neglected is all. Let the kids stay with Courier for a week or so, I don’t think there’s any harm in that. And trust me, not working is the best, you’re gonna love this mini vacation thing your boyfriend is bugging you about.” Hacker stretched his arms behind his head lazily.

The man Swindler guessed was Ryan poked his head into the room. “HEY! Hacker, get back to work! You already had your break today!”

Hacker rose from his seat and sighed. “Well, duty calls. No rest for the wicked, as they say. But that implies there is rest for the righteous, which would include you, so I suggest you go home and start helping the kids pack so you and your boyfriend can have your little romantic getaway.” He wiggled his eyebrows at Swindler, and ran away cackling when she half-heartedly swatted at him.

“Are you sure you’ll be okay?” Swindler fretted over the children, hands fluttering anxiously over their hair and their collars, making sure their clothing was adjusted correctly.

Brother nodded and lifted the carrier he was holding. “We have Purrfessor, we’ll be okay.” 

Purrfessor meowed quietly from the carrier.

That cat was so strange. Most cats, seeing a carrier, would panic and hide, but Purrfessor had simply strolled in and settled down immediately.

“And we’ll have Courier, too! We’ll be okay, don’t worry!” Sister piped up.

Courier nodded from behind the children, and took Swindler’s twitching hands into his own. “She’s right. They’ll be fine.”

Swindler nodded with uncertainty.

Sister turned to look up at Courier hopefully, “Are we gonna go out for takoyaki?”

“Sure, we can.”

“Yay!” Sister cheered happily. “We should go now! We’ll be okay, big sis, don’t worry!”

And with that, the three of them left, the kids promising to call her and Courier promising updates on how they’re doing. Swindler thought she heard Sister cheer for takoyaki as they left. 

Once the door closed, the house seemed too quiet for Swindler. She had gotten used to the minute sounds of the kids walking around or talking to each other, of the cat purring quietly on the couch, and now that they were missing Swindler almost felt alone. The only thing she could hear now was Cutthroat’s near-silent footsteps, and her own breathing.

Cutthroat wrapped his arms around Swindler from behind. 

“It’s just you and me now, angel.” 

He nuzzled into her, and Swindler was so busy missing everyone that she didn’t catch how giddy Cutthroat sounded, and the edge on his smile as he pressed it against her shoulder.

Chapter Text

“So, why did I receive a text at 6:00 in the morning asking if we could meet?” Doctor asked. 

Despite it being so early in the morning, she still looked impeccable. A harsh contrast to how Swindler felt. 

They had met up at the only place that was open this early in the morning, the coffee shop. The same one they’d had their first disastrous meeting at. 

Doctor took a sip of her espresso. “At least those two imbeciles aren’t working here anymore, I don’t know if I could handle that.” 

Swindler looked away sweating, refraining from telling Doctor about her helping them with various job applications.

“A-Anyway, I texted you because...I guess I just feel really anxious.”

“I may be a doctor, hun, but I don’t think I can do much about that.”

“I don’t mean like, medically anxious, I just don’t feel...comfortable? The kids have already stayed with Courier for two weeks, one more week than they were planned to. I keep wanting them to come back, but Cutthroat insists that they can stay with Courier just a little longer… I just don’t know what to do.”

Doctor could feel the unease from her last conversation with Cutthroat coming back. She suddenly didn’t want her espresso anymore and even moved it away from her slightly.

Swindler noticed this movement and raised her eyebrows. “Do you...erm…”

“Do you remember that day you and I had our conversation? And Cutthroat and I talked while you and Sister made dinner together?”

“Yes...why?”

“Well…” Doctor shifted in her seat. She wasn’t sure how to go about this. “When we were talking, Cutthroat mentioned that he’s been feeling a bit...neglected? That’s not quite the right word. He said that he felt like you weren’t spending enough time together... I felt a bit uneasy when he said that, but I wasn’t sure why. I think I know now.”

Swindler felt her gut clench. What could be so unnerving as to make even Doctor uneasy?

“I’m sure you know that before you two started dating, Cutthroat was keeping an eye on you.”

“Yes, but I didn’t think it was that bad… and he’s been doing really well lately, we’re really working on it.”

“Are you sure about that? You can’t always keep an eye on him, you know. And it’s not very ideal to have to essentially babysit your partner, is it?”

Swindler looked down at her lap.

Doctor went on, a little gentler this time. “As of right now, your relationship isn’t equal. You’re putting a lot in, when you shouldn’t have to. Until Cutthroat starts trying more and understanding the weight of his actions, the imbalance is just going to continue. I think that’s important to consider for your relationship.

I think what’s happening is that Cutthroat is relapsing into his old ways, because of this change of having the children to care for. He’s not happy with the change, and is trying to make things go back to the way they used to be.”

“...and that’s why he wanted the kids to go with my brother for a bit…”

“Exactly.”

“But what should I do about it?”

“I know this is going to be difficult for you, Swindler, but you’re going to have to show a little backbone.”

“Wha…?”

“You need to confront him about it. Nothing is going to change if you keep allowing this behavior to continue.”

“I see…”

“So now you know.” Doctor took one last sip of her now-cold espresso, and rose to leave. “I have to leave for my shift at the hospital, don’t forget what I said. You had better not come back again saying you didn’t go through with it.”

Before Doctor could leave, Swindler caught her wrist. “Um, thank you for- for helping me. It’s really nice of you.”

“Hmph. Don’t keep expecting this, I’m not known for being a softie, you know.” But Swindler could hear the smile in her voice, even if Doctor tried to hide it by turning away.

“Ah, angel, you’re home!”

Cutthroat hurried to the entrance and hugged Swindler, excited she was home, but she didn’t hug him back.

“Yeah, I’m back…”

Cutthroat pulled away and rested his hands on her shoulders, looking at her from an arm’s length. Swindler was looking to the side, her eyebrows furrowed in concern and anxiety.

“Hm? What’s wrong? Aren’t you happy to see me?” Cutthroat looked at her sadly, begging her to look at him.

“It’s, um… Can I talk to you about something?”

Cutthroat tilted his head in confusion. “What is it?”

Swindler didn’t respond immediately, taking off her coat and shoes and still not looking at Cutthroat directly. “...Let’s go sit down in the living room, and I’ll tell you.”

“So what is it? Will you please tell me? If you’re mad at me, I’m sorry! I’ll do anything to make you happy again!”

Swindler sighed unsteadily. “It’s about Brother and Sister.”

“Oh! They’re fine, Courier already called while you were out! Don’t worry about them, they can stay with Courier longer!”

“That’s what I needed to talk to you about. Before, you kept wanting them to stay with Courier for a bit, and after they left you kept insisting that they stay with him, ‘just a little longer.’ I was uncomfortable with it before, and the longer they’re gone, the more uncomfortable I get. Why do you want them to stay away?” Swindler’s bangs were hiding her eyes. Cutthroat rarely saw Swindler get like this, he couldn’t understand what was wrong!

“I just want to spend more time with you! You know I get a bit jealous when I have to share you with other people, hehe! I just wanted to keep you for myself for a little bit!”

“Do you just want things to go back to the way they were before?”

“Yes! I miss when I didn’t have to share you.”

“And is that why you won’t let Brother and Sister come back? Are you ever going to want them to come back?” Swindler asked sharply, tense. Cutthroat felt stunned, but he tried to recover and smiled.

“W-Well they can come back at some point, but I just wanted to keep you a bit longer! There’s no harm in that, right?”

“It’s not as harmless as you think, Cutthroat.” Swindler could feel herself breaking a little. “I have been forced to be separated from them for years , and now that I finally have them back in my life, I’m being separated from them again! I don’t think you understand that they’re my family , I can’t lose them again.”

Cutthroat felt desperation rise up in him. “You’re not losing them again, Swindler, they’re safe and happy with Courier! You can visit them whenever you want! They aren’t going away!”

“But they are away. My family isn’t something you can just separate so you can have me for myself. I’m not a possession to keep for yourself.”

“But I’m not keeping you away from them. It’s for your own good, so that you can stay with me forever, with no one getting in the way! I’m just doing this for you , for us !”

Swindler finally looked at Cutthroat, for the first time since she got home, and Cutthroat could feel his words die in his throat when he saw that she had tears in her eyes.

“You’re doing this for my own good? No, you aren’t. You’re doing it for yourself .” Swindler clenched her hands at her sides. “You know, my biological parents would always say that what they were doing was for my own good. It never was.”

Before Cutthroat could respond, Swindler was stalking back to the front door.

“W-Wait, angel, come back! I can fix this, you know I didn’t mean anything by it!”

Swindler started pulling her coat and shoes back on. “It doesn’t matter if you didn’t mean to hurt me, Cutthroat, it did anyway. Your actions have consequences, even if you didn’t want them to.”

“Where are you going? Please stay, I’m sorry!”

“I’m going to go stay with my brother for a bit, I think I need some space for a little while. Please think about what we talked about.”

“No, you can’t leave! You can’t leave me--!”

There was a crack, Cutthroat’s eyes were wide with shock. Swindler’s hand was still raised, and he could feel his cheek stinging. Tears rolled freely down her cheeks, and she slowly lowered her hand. “I’m sorry, Cutthroat, but I’m leaving. You can’t stop me.”

Swindler started to open the front door, but Cutthroat put his hand over hers on the doorknob, a last attempt to make her stay. “I love you.”

She looked at him one last time, her expression unreadable. “Is that enough, though?”

The door closing was deafening to Cutthroat. He wanted to be frustrated, but he could never be angry with his angel. Why was she so upset? Couldn’t she understand that everything he did, he did for her? Her siblings were inconsequential in the face of their love, the love between them was more important than anything!

It’s okay, he thought to himself, she’s just a bit upset right now. She’ll come back soon and everything will be fine again. After all, Cutthroat brought his hand to his stinging cheek, where Swindler had slapped him, nothing is stronger than our love. Not even blood.

Courier was busy getting his ass handed to him in Monopoly by Brother and Sister (Sister was in the lead because she kept giving him and Brother puppy eyes every time she landed in a bad spot, Brother close in second place because he was just crazy good at Monopoly), when there was a quiet knock on the door. Courier was all too happy to get away from his pathetic spot in the game and answer the door.

The lighthearted atmosphere died as soon as he saw Swindler at the doorstep, eyes red and dried tears on her cheeks, still sniffling.

Courier felt murder , but he repressed it in favor of giving Swindler a hug, which she returned immediately. He could feel Brother and Sister’s curious and concerned gazes on them.

“What happened?” Courier asked softly as Swindler rubbed her face on his shirt.

She sniffled. “C-Cutthroat and I got into a fight, that’s all. I’m staying here for a little while, if that’s okay…”

“Of course you can. The kids and I were just playing Monopoly, they’re kicking my ass. Do you wanna join?”

Swindler’s face was still buried in his chest, but she nodded.

As Brother and Sister ran up and hugged her tightly as she wiped her cheeks with her sleeves, Courier was already planning Cutthroat’s demise. 

Chapter Text

Swindler’s phone vibrated again, its screen lighting up again showing yet another unread text from Cutthroat, adding to the 37 texts and 12 missed calls. Swindler laid on the couch, face in a pillow and Purrfessor curled up on her back, purring gently. 

It’d been like this for a few days now, Cutthroat trying to contact Swindler a few times a day and the latter completely ignoring him. The twins were happy to see Swindler again after those few weeks, but seeing her like this was depressing. It was just so out of character for her to be acting this way.

“What do you think we should do?” Sister smushed her face against the kitchen table while Courier munched on toast and checked his email. “Mmh.” and a shrug was his response. Sister pouted at him, her face looking even more round and squished because of the way it was pressed against the wood.

“Swindler has always been like this when she’s having relationship troubles,” Courier looked at Sister properly this time when responding, “not that it happens often. She’ll get over it soon.”

“But it’s so sad to see her like this,” Sister mumbled.

“Why don’t you try doing something with her, then? It’ll help get her mind off things, and you guys won’t be bored watching her mope.”

“It’s not about being bored, I’m just sad to see her so sad! And it’s not even her fault, Cutthroat was just being a jerkface. I couldn’t believe it when she told us what happened.”

“Now that I can agree with.”

Sister sighed and got up from the table as Courier returned to his phone and toast.

“Swindler? Do you wanna play something?”

While Sister had been in the kitchen, Brother had come out of his room and started painting Swindler’s toenails purple. “You’re going to have to wait until her nails dry, don’t ruin my handiwork.”

“We can play something if you guys want.” Swindler’s voice was muffled by the pillow. “What do you two want to play?”

Before Sister could answer, there was a knock at the front door. “...Hm? I’ll get it.”

She peeked from behind the door, and met a pair of familiar lavender eyes. “Hi-!”

Sister slammed the door.

“He’s here!”

“Who’s here?” Brother was just finishing the last few strokes on Swindler’s big toe.

“ Him! ”

They could hear the sound of a chair scraping against the floor in the kitchen, and Courier appeared in the doorway. “Who’s here?”

Sister edged away from the door as Courier strolled up and opened it again.

“Hi! Is Swindler here?”

Courier slammed the door.

“Wait! Is she here?” Cutthroat’s voice was muffled but audible, and he started knocking again. 

Everyone jumped as Swindler suddenly moved for the first time since she laid down that morning. She curled tighter into the fetal position, clutching the pillow. “I don’t want to see him right now.”

Courier pinched the bridge of his nose. “God… I’ll take care of this. You guys,” he pointed at Sister and Brother, “Stay with her.”

As Sister returned to Swindler’s side, Courier opened the door right as Cutthroat started knocking again. Before the other man could say anything, Courier growled, “We’re talking outside , got it?”

After practically dragging Cutthroat outside (the idiot had tried to run past Courier and into the house), Courier glared at him. “Get the fuck out of here, she isn’t going to talk to you after all the bullshit you pulled.”

“But I need to talk to her! This is all a misunderstanding, I’m sure-”

“It really isn’t, though. You intentionally got the kids out of the house so you could have her all to yourself, like a possessive asshole, and lied to her to do it. When she told you she wanted them to come back, you manipulated her to keep them away. And finally, when she realized all this shit you’ve pulled, you had the audacity to tell her that you were justified in forcing her and her family apart. There’s nothing to misinterpret here.”

Cutthroat blinked at Courier’s words, then responded, “That’s all wrong, I didn’t manipulate her or anything like that! Sure, I might have lied about some things, but they were just little things, I didn’t do it to hurt her! I just wanted her to pay more attention to me, is all. There isn’t anything wrong with being protective of your partner, is there?”

“Yes, when you’re coercing them into separating from their loved ones. Swindler has the right to be with her other loved ones, you don’t get to tell her otherwise.”

Cutthroat’s eyes glinted possessively. “But I want to be the only loved one. Swindler has a big heart, she wants to love and pay attention to everyone. But just having a portion of her heart isn’t enough, I want all of it . She should only have eyes for me. I don’t mind having to gently separate her from everyone else to accomplish that.”

“ You piece of shit. ” Courier’s voice suddenly went quiet and intense, and before Cutthroat could react, Courier had gotten in his space and grabbed  the front of his shirt. “I don’t know where you got the idea that you have the right to control Swindler’s life, but if you want to ever be in the same general vicinity of her again, you better fucking listen to what I’m about to tell you.

Swindler hasn’t had it fucking easy, and if you knew even half the shit she’s been through, you would know that what you did was not fucking okay. Her biological family neglected and abused her to the point that she was traumatised , then she had her only two siblings ripped away from her, and after all that, she was thrown into multiple shitty foster homes until she was able to be permanently adopted with my family. The entire first half of her life was spent being abused , and she still came out of it with more goodness in her pinky nail than I have in my whole body. 

And you know what? You’re doing the exact same thing everyone else in her life has done: you’re hurting her for your own selfish reasons . When you decided to fucking tear her away from her siblings again after being apart for more than a decade, you weren’t doing it because you cared about her. You were doing it because you only cared about yourself , and what you wanted. You didn’t care what she wanted or who she cared about; all that mattered was that you got your precious thing all to yourself, like a fucking child who doesn’t want to share his favorite doll.”

Cutthroat’s eyebrows furrowed. “You’re wrong, that’s not it at all! She’s mine , I love her-”

“Love?! You don’t know one damn thing about love. Love is respecting her enough to let her make her own decisions, being there for her when she needs you and supporting her when she needs to be away, it’s caring for the other people in her life, love is being there for her no matter what . All you know is how to take, and take, and take . 

Swindler is her own fucking person , and no one has the right to tell her what to do or what to think, and least of all who she cherishes , and if she knew what I know about you, she would leave your sorry ass and never look back.”

Courier let go of Cutthroat’s shirt and shoved him away, allowing him to stumble back. “What you need to understand is that you hurt her . It doesn’t matter why you did it. Your actions caused her to suffer for your own benefit, and that makes you just like her abusers .”

Cutthroat could only stare stunned at the ground as Courier walked back into the house and slammed the door.

Cutthroat managed to haul himself back home, though the only thing he could think about was what Courier had said.

He almost refused to believe it. Him? As bad as Swindler’s abusers? There was no way. It was clear that the people who abused her in the past just didn’t really love her; they didn’t love her in the right way. They just wanted a thing to not see or deal with until they wanted something to scream at, they just wanted something to control : they didn’t love her. Not the way Cutthroat loved her: he wanted to have her only to himself, to be allowed to shower her with affection anytime he wanted, he wanted her to be his and his alone.

But isn’t that just the same as the people in her past?

This thought gave Cutthroat pause.

They may have wanted to do different things to Swindler and wanted to treat her differently, but at its core, it was the same: they wanted to own and control her for their own interests. Neither of them cared what they had to do to accomplish that.

Cutthroat could feel himself crumbling as he felt the cold realization of the truth.

God, what had he done?

Chapter Text

It had been a week since Cutthroat tried to visit her at Courier’s house, and Swindler’s phone had been completely silent since then. No calls, no texts. Nothing. It was surreal, to say the least. She’d almost gotten used to her phone blowing up with notifications. Ever since she and Cutthroat first exchanged phone numbers, he had always sent a steady stream of texts and notifications, but now it was completely, eerily, silent. Swindler was almost concerned about his well being, had he lost his phone? Gotten hurt? Or maybe worse? Or maybe he had finally gotten bored of her, and just left.

Regardless of the reason, Swindler was concerned.

“Your phone has been really quiet lately,” Sister commented as she caught Swindler staring at her phone.

“Good,” grunted Courier.

Swindler gave a long-suffering sigh. “It has been completely quiet, I’m a bit worried. This isn’t normal at all.”

“Maybe he finally figured out what’s good for him and decided to leave you alone before I made him.” 

Swindler dropped her head on the dining table. “I needed space, but I don’t think I needed this much!”

Brother and Sister exchanged a look. 

“Do you really miss him?” Brother asked.

“I mean,” Swindler rested her chin against the table, tracing the grain of the table with her finger, “yeah, I do. I still love him, you know, he’s just being a big doodoo head.” 

Sister giggled at that.

“I’m not actually mad at him anymore...I just wish he would realize that what he did hurt me, and more importantly hurt you guys.” 

Courier looked like he’d just sucked a lemon. “Maybe you should still be mad at him.”

“Not everyone holds grudges like you, Courier.”

“Hmph.”

As if on cue, Swindler’s personalized ringtone (Red by Taylor Swift, Cutthroat insisted it was their song, even though their song was obviously not that) for Cutthroat started ringing for the first time in a week.

“Speak of the devil…” grumbled Courier.

“Oh God oh God!” Swindler dropped her phone on the table as if it were scalding. “When I said I wanted him to contact me I didn’t mean now! ”

“Are you going to pick it up?!” Even Brother and Sister were panicking.

“Ahh, I don’t know!”

Before Swindler could decide, the song faded, leaving behind a “missed call” notification. The room sighed in relief. Now that Swindler regained arm control, she picked her phone back up and frowned.

“Now I feel a little bad for not picking up…”

Courier couldn’t resist groaning at that. So indecisive. 

“Oh! He left a voice message.”

“Great. Now stop worrying about it. And please change your ringtone for him, I almost went insane back when he was calling you nonstop.”

“But it’s our unofficial song .”

“If that’s the unofficial one, I don’t wanna know what the official one is.”

“It’s-”

“I SAID I DON’T WANT TO KNOW.”

“...ANYWAY. I wonder what message he left.”

“The only way to know is to listen to it.” Brother offered unhelpfully. 

“Ugh! I can’t bring myself to do it!” Swindler had her head back on the dinner table, phone sitting beside her.

“It’s already been an hour! You’ve gotta listen to it eventually ,” Sister said. She and Brother had been sitting next to Swindler as she’d gone back and forth, almost listening to the message before slamming the phone facedown on the table. 

“Would it help if we listened to it for you?” In the past hour, Brother had peeled and eaten three oranges. He was on his fourth.

“No!”

Sister sighed. “I’m gonna go watch TV, Blue’s Clues comes on about now.”

“I’m coming with you, anything’s more interesting than watching Swindler’s decision making process.” Brother gathered his peeled orange and followed Sister out of the kitchen. Before long, the sounds of the TV quietly played in the background. 

The white noise helped Swindler think, at least a little bit. 

He hadn’t even sent a text yet. 

Usually, when she took a while to answer a call or text, he would keep trying. But there was only the voicemail. 

Swindler turned on her phone once again and stared down at the call notification, Cutthroat’s little profile picture smiling up at her. Seeing the cheerful photo just made her feel worse.

“I’m sorry for taking so long,” she murmured at it. “...God. Now I’m talking to his profile picture.” Maybe I miss him more than I think I do . I wish everything was back to normal and I could just talk to him again.

It was that thought that pushed Swindler over the edge.

Hesitantly, she opened the notification, then pressed play.

“Um, hi ange- Swindler. Hi...how are you today? Have you eaten yet? Did you remember to go to your doctor’s appointment on Wednsd- wait, that’s weird, stop. Um...How are Sister and Brother doing? I, uh, I wanted to talk to you about something, but I can see you’re busy right now… Ca-Can we meet? Tomorrow...at the park close by the house...I’ll be waiting tomorrow, I want to talk to you about something important. I hope you’ll come… Bye, I lo-”

The voicemail was cut off at the end. Cutthroat’s voice had sounded uncharacteristically...aware. It was rough and unsteady, as if he hadn’t spoken in a long time. Swindler had never heard Cutthroat sound like that before. 

Although her previous concern for him was assuaged, it was replaced with a new one about how different he was acting, and what he could want to talk to her about. He’d even asked how Brother and Sister were doing. 

Swindler was so focused on her thoughts and trying to decipher Cutthroat’s message that she didn’t realize the TV had gone silent.

“Did you listen to the message?” Brother asked from behind Swindler, startling her.

“Yes, I did. He...wanted to talk to me about something. Tomorrow.”

“Are you gonna go?”

“...Yes. It seems important, and if I’m honest, I’m a little concerned about him. He sounded strange in the voice message.”

“Stranger than usual?” Courier’s voice took them by surprise. 

“Strange because he wasn’t acting very strange at all.”

“That’s weird!” Sister popped out from behind Courier.

“Yeah,” Swindler thought for a moment. “He just seems like he’s not himself right now. I want to make sure everything is okay, and to see what he wanted to talk to me about. So I’m going to meet him tomorrow.”

Courier’s usual scowl deepened a bit. “You want me to come with you?”

“No, I think this is something I need to do myself. Plus I have a feeling you just want to intimidate him.” 

“Caught me. I’m just a big meanie that wants to be mean.” Courier deadpanned, and Sister giggled.
“...You know, I was worried that Brother and Sister would pick up your language, but turns out I should have worried about the other way around.”

Brother snorted. “No shit.” 

Brother was forced to relinquish a quarter to the (almost full) swear jar.

Swindler had been hoping that it would be a sunny, clear day, but from the moment she woke up that morning it was absolutely pouring. She was still going to show up, of course, but she hoped that it would lighten up a bit when she actually left the house. It didn’t.

She’d also wanted to be the first one to arrive, give her some extra time to think and prepare for the many, many ways this could go. So she arrived ten minutes early.

Cutthroat was already there. 

Even from afar, Swindler could tell that Cutthroat was just not feeling right. His hair and clothing was disheveled, and he had dark bags under his unusually dull eyes. He was at least carrying an umbrella, but it seemed more to be a force of habit, and while he was holding it above him, it was only partially shielding him from the rain. He either didn’t seem to care, or was too lost in thought to notice that he was getting wet.

“Cutthroat.” Swindler meant to call out to him, but his name died in her throat. He still heard her anyway, over the rain.

“...Swindler.”

She finally caught up to him and stretched her umbrella between them so they could talk without a curtain of rain between them, and to also cover where he was getting rained on.

“You came.” Cutthroat sounded relieved, as if he thought she wouldn’t actually show. However, he didn’t meet her gaze.

“Yes, I did.” Swindler said softly. “I was getting a bit worried, I hadn’t heard from you for over a week before I received your voice message. I wondered if you were doing alright.” 

Cutthroat didn’t say anything in response, instead seeming to shrink into his coat. Despite the difference in their heights and builds, he still seemed so small. He almost looked like a snail retreating into its shell, little antennae drooping and body cowering.

“What did you want to talk to me about?” 

“I…” Cutthroat swallowed hard, as if he were trying to swallow down the ache in his throat. “I’m sorry.”

It came out as a whisper, shaky and rasping.

“I’m sorry for what I did. I didn’t realize I was hurting you, and Brother and Sister, but that doesn’t make it alright. I was being selfish and horrible, and I didn’t even realize until Courier smacked the truth into my head.”

There were tears coursing down his face now. He didn’t move to wipe them, but when Swindler reached out to thumb them away he flinched. Her hand retreated.

“You don't… have to ever forgive me. I just wanted you to know… that I’m sorry.”

That seemed to be the end of what Cutthroat had to say, him visibly clamming up and ducking his head to stare at the ground.
Swindler breathed out a sigh. She reached her hand out again to brush his tears away, and this time he let her. “You know, I already forgave you a long time ago.”

Cutthroat didn’t visibly react, but she could feel him stiffen.

“I didn’t stay away because I was still mad at you, necessarily. I stayed away because I wanted you to realize what you did was wrong and that it really hurt us, and I didn’t want Brother and Sister to stay in that situation if it wasn’t going to change.” 

Although there weren’t any more tears spilling down his cheeks, her thumb kept brushing them comfortingly, and for the first time that day, Cutthroat met her eyes.

Swindler gave him a smile. “I forgive you, and I’m so glad you made the effort to change and realize what was wrong. I love you.” 

Slowly, she pulled him into a hug. Cutthroat nuzzled her shoulder in relief. It felt like forever since he got to smell her strawberry shampoo.

When they finally pulled away, it looked like a weight had been lifted off him, and Swindler could see the beginning of that familiar sparkle back in his eyes again.

“I can’t guarantee that Brother and Sister will forgive you, and I definitely can’t be certain that Courier will ever forgive you, but that is something you’ll just have to deal with. Making a bed and lying in it and all that.” Swindler teased softly with a small grin, and Cutthroat took her hand gently in response.

“I know.”

The rain continued coming down hard with no end in sight, but with the two of them reunited, even in dreary weather the scent of rain made it worth it.