Monoceros felt sick to his stomach, but he was determined to finally confront Arsenolite about the complete and utter bullshit he'd been feeding him. He was tired. So, so ******** tired. Of the lies. Of the abandonment. Of the everything. He didn't like being here, he didn't like feeling like at any moment it was all going to come crashing down on him because he said or did the slightest wrong thing. It was all so oppressive and suffocating and... He was just going to confront Arsenolite. Instead of doing this dance of avoidance and suffering whatever consequences would eventually rain down on him.

He took a slow, deep breath, and contacted him on the pad.

It didn't take long for Arsenolite to show up.

Not long before he got the message, Arsenolite had really... just been relaxing and having a good time. He'd been hanging out with Sakuriite, just enjoying each other's company with her as they watched a movie they'd both seen a hundred million times, when the message had popped up on his screen. He almost didn't grab it, but he knew he should—being a Captain meant he had responsibilities now, and he needed to pay attention to everything he got so he could do his duty and not get in trouble. That, and the motivation from Queen Laurelite about not letting her down made him perk up and check his tablet, nearly dropping it when he saw who the message was from. Monoceros.

Concern and relief both filled him. He'd been trying to give Monoceros his space, let his former brother recover from whatever had happened with Michel back then. At the time, he'd thought it was good for Monoceros, a good test to see if he would remain loyal, a good way to give Monoceros some time to come into his own and fight some a*****e Knight—and Monoceros had clearly gotten away, so it had certainly worked, but... for the longest time after, Monoceros hadn't talked to anybody, choosing to remain silent and in his own little world. It had worried Arsenolite, but he'd respected Monoceros' choices. He needed some time and space, and Arsenolite was giving it.

Now it was time to stop giving him space (which made Arsenolite happy—hopefully, this would finally be him getting his brother back to normal, back to some semblance of being human and wanting to socialize again). He gave Sakuriite a quick kiss goodbye, with a short comment about Monoceros needing him, and teleported.

"Hey, 'Ceros. What's up?" he asked, putting on an air of a guy completely unbothered and unconcerned.

Monoceros cleared his throat, his courage suddenly dying, shriveling up and withering away inside him. s**t. No, no, no. He had to do this. He had to know. He couldn't let this opportunity escape him just because some small part of him hated confrontation. Sometimes, it just had to happen. You had to take life by the throat and shove the lemons back down its throat.

"Why did you just leave me there?" he asked quietly, voice cracking, and he cleared his throat again. "Back when Michel attacked us? You left me. Alone."

Ah. This. Well, at least he could relax a bit. Monoceros would more than likely understand why Arsenolite had done what he'd done.

He smiled easily. "Because, dearest brother, you've gotta push the bird from the nest and make it learn to fly sometime, right? You needed to learn some confidence. You got out of there, didn't ya? Couldn't have been that bad, especially after I caused a distraction. That stupid Knight had no idea what hit him."

It took everything Monoceros had to not leap across the space between them and slug Arsenolite in his stupid, smug face. Acting all magnanimous about it, like he'd done Monoceros a favor by leaving him all alone, almost pants-wettingly terrified out of his mind, to a Knight who, only by some actual factual miracle, decided not to kill him. That he would be more worth something alive than dead. Some spark inside that Knight that remembered who Monoceros had been before, before Monoceros got warped and twisted into this empty shell of himself.

The lies had mounted and turned him into something ugly, caught in this dark web like the most stupid little fly.

Only, he didn't know who was the real liar. His head swam with it all. Arsenolite was an a*****e, but so were a lot of the people he'd met on both sides. Marialite was nice enough. But everything just felt... like static.

Except for his white-hot anger at Arsenolite. He wasn't sure where it was coming from, but if Arsenolite wasn't lying about them having been brothers before, he supposed some part of him must have remembered that and was really ticked off because of sibling rivalry s**t.

At least it felt like something, though, so he leaned into it.

"You left me to DIE!" he shouted suddenly, thunderously. "He was going to kill me, you dumb piece of s**t! I only lived because I fell apart, crying my ******** eyes out, and telling him I had no idea who he was or what he was talking about, because you're a ******** liar and you won't tell me jack s**t about who I was before I woke up like THIS!"

Arsenolite was taken aback by the sudden ferocity, coming close to actually physically stepping back, but managing to not let himself show such weakness. He rolled his neck and shoulders, stood up straighter, tilted his chin up, and glared down at Monoceros.

"I've told you what you needed to know," he snapped coldly, feeling the familiar stinging anger from years of being constantly mad at his former brother, "You've been doing just fine! Sure, maybe a bit lost, but I love having you here! I missed you, man. And now, what, you're spitting on that because I wanted to make you stronger? Make you more like the man you should be here?"

Monoceros clenched his fists and turned away before he did actually punch Arsenolite in his stupid, smug face.

"Don't turn your back on me! You know I'm right," Arsenolite snarled, reaching for Monoceros' shoulder.

Monoceros sensed the movement before he felt anything and took this opportunity to teleport to one of the disused roofs in Destiny City. He couldn't handle this anymore. He needed to be alone again.

To figure out what to do, when his life had been fed to him in lies sloppily wrapped in poorly disguised bows.

Did he even have a life worth living?